What Future is There?
by the ramblin rose
Summary: This story follows the relationship between Daryl and Michonne. Is there a future for them? What kind of future can anyone hope for when the dead outnumber the living and dying is a way of life? What do they have left to hope for? Daronne, Micharyl, Dixonne (Please note that while they are the main characters, the whole group is part of the story.)
1. Chapter 1

AN: This is an AU story. Therefore the characters and plot, though somewhat related, do not follow those of the television show nor the comic in their entirety. I have adapted them to conform to my own imagination. If characters being OOC or OCs bother you, then this may not be the story for you. Some spelling and grammatical errors will probably occur. Sorry.

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Daryl leaned against the wall, and took another swig of his beer. When he was on his first he had thought it tasted like warm piss, but the more he drank, the more he didn't mind the taste. Tonight was a night to celebrate, or at least a night to forget. Maggie and Glenn had gone on one of the best runs that they'd ever had in one of the surrounding towns and brought back a delivery van full of everything imaginable, including enough alcohol to flood the prison. Tyreese and Sasha had taken watch and now everyone was sitting in, what Daryl could only call the living room, drinking beer and chatting. There was a lot of laughing going on, more than he'd heard in ages. More than he'd heard since this whole thing started.

Michonne sat by herself against a far wall, her knees drawn up to her chest, staring out in front of her, occasionally taking a drink from the bottle that she held loosely in her hands. Daryl had noticed that for as little as he was interacting with the group tonight, she was doing even less.

Michonne was the kind of woman that fascinated Daryl, but frightened him too. He knew how to hold his own around many of the brainless chatterboxes that he had dated before this whole thing started. He even knew how to handle the other women that had come through the group, but he didn't know how to handle Michonne.

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Michonne sipped on her beer, taking it slow. She was on her second one and already she felt like her head was a little lighter than she wanted it to be. Everyone was in such high spirits tonight. It was as though they had already drank to a point where for a moment they were experiencing the thrill of complete, drunken oblivion. As much as she wanted to experience that oblivion, to be able to forget all that had happened, all that had been lost, and the fact that a madman still lurked somewhere wanting to kill her, and probably to kill all of them, she knew that the alcohol wouldn't do it. She'd forget for a while, but then she'd just wake up with a headache.

Everyone else was willing to take the chance, and she envied them a little. Daryl seemed like the only one that wasn't joining in on the storytelling and laughing at the silliness they so seldom indulged in. He was sitting on the other side of the room, obviously doing his share of drinking, but not really looking as joyful as the rest. Maybe he, like herself, just wasn't able to get past the reality of it all, even for a night. She'd been watching him out of the corner of her eye, and seen him watching her. Sometimes he made her nervous when he watched her like that, like maybe he could read her mind.

"How about you, Michonne?" When she heard her name, Michonne looked up. She really had no idea what was going on in the room.

"What?" She asked.

"How about you?" Maggie asked again. "What do you miss the most?"

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Daryl had been following the game they were playing. _What did you miss the most?_ Of course, all the answers so far had been the silly things they missed. They missed delivery pizza. They missed the Super Bowl. They missed listening to the radio in the car. They missed ice cream. This wasn't the real game of "What do you miss the most?", it was the happy game they wanted to play. No one was really telling the truth. _I miss my loved ones. I miss going to bed at night and not really believing that I might die tomorrow. I miss talking about the future. _No one talked about the future now. It didn't exist. All that was really left was "now".

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The question struck Michonne. She was first moved by the fact that she'd been invited to join the conversation. She wasn't exactly actively participating. Then she was struck by the overwhelming possibilities of answers. _My daughters. I miss my daughters._ She looked at the faces of the people who she was coming to know as her group. This band of misfits that was trying so hard to form some kind of family in the midst of all of this and she knew that tonight was about forgetting. She decided against answering truthfully. Something simple would do for tonight.

"Bubble baths." She said.

"Yes!" Rachel shouted. She was one of the newest in the group. She had come with Tyreese and Sasha seeking refuge from the madman. She was also Rick's new arm candy, glued to him at all times. "I used to love soaking in the tub for hours!" She was also obviously very drunk, Michonne thought.

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Daryl was a little taken aback by Michonne's response. Not because she had been nice to the group and let them have their fun by throwing them something trivial, but because she had chosen bubble baths, which seemed like something very feminine. It seemed like something so very not like Michonne. He looked at her for a minute, trying to see past the person he'd come to regard as a respectable Walker killer and all around bad ass, and also the most preferred person to go on a run with him. He tried to imagine the Michonne from before, the kind of woman who would have taken bubble baths, and it reminded him that they had all been different before the world went to hell and that he knew nothing about her.

He let his eyes linger a moment on her. He was picturing her first, in a bathtub with a book, covered in bubbles and relaxing somewhere, and then his mind drifted to picturing her naked. She had a nice body, and a pretty face. For a moment he thought that he wouldn't mind seeing her naked.

Then her eyes met his as she took a drink of her beer, and he shook the thought out of his head. It was just the beer. He blushed a little at the thought, and decided he would go to bed. He'd be more clear-headed than most of them when he woke up, so he could take morning watch.

"Umm…night, y'all." He said, rising to his feet. As he walked away he could hear the echoing of everyone telling him goodnight, and when he lie down in bed he could still hear them laughing and talking. As he closed his eyes, he tried to get the image of Michonne that he had created for himself out of his mind.

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For a moment Michonne wasn't sure of what to make of the situation. When she glanced at Daryl, he had been looking at her, but it wasn't just the hazy out of focus look that he usually wore when he was just thinking about other things and his eyes settled on someone. He had been looking at her very intently, like he might have been trying to look through her or inside of her. And then, when he realized she was looking at him, he had nervously left the room.

She had mentioned bubble baths. Was he thinking about her? She dismissed the idea. Probably not. She'd never heard Daryl voice his opinions on her skin tone, but knowing Merle she couldn't imagine that two brothers could have grown up with very different perspectives.

Michonne yawned. It was getting late and she was on morning watch. She should probably go to bed. The three beers that she drank had left her head swimming enough for one night. She stood up and quietly went to her cell, fairly certain that no one would notice she was gone. After all, the only one that had been watching her all night was already asleep.

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AN: What do you think? Comments are welcome, just please no telling me that someone is OOC or wouldn't say or do something. I'm adapting the characters to my will and am not following the characterization of the comics nor the television show. I hope some of you will enjoy this project (which I hope to be a long one). I'm writing merely for my own entertainment.


	2. Chapter 2

When Michonne woke up it was later than she had intended. She was on the morning watch and hoped that nothing too exciting had happened before she got out there. She quickly got dressed, grabbed her katana and headed to the kitchen for a cup of coffee. When she got in the kitchen, she was surprised to find it empty. Usually Carol or Hershel were at least up in time for the morning watch, but the kitchen was abandoned. She considered making coffee for a moment, but then decided to just go ahead and head out for watch.

Before she headed for the watchtower they were using after the Governor's failed attack, she circled around the parameters checking some of the places in the fences. Unfortunately the Governor's attack had not left the prison entirely undamaged. They had lost two of their lookout spots, weakening significantly their view of the surrounding areas, and the fences had been damaged in more than a few places. Despite their best efforts to patch the fences, they had still had a few more Walkers than they were comfortable with break their way through.

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On the one hand, Daryl could say that he was having the best kind of watch there was. Nothing was happening, and nothing had happened since he'd taken over for Tyreese and Sasha hours ago. On the other hand he had to admit that he was bored and was beginning to doze off a little. Normally they did watches in pairs so that there was almost always someone to talk to, but after last night's little shindig, Daryl wasn't sure if anyone would be joining him.

Then he spotted Michonne walking around the fences, her katana strapped to her back. She was obviously coming to join him on watch. There wouldn't be much conversation, but he might be able to drag enough out of her to make the time pass.

Daryl lifted his binoculars and watched Michonne as she continued her inspection. He'd already checked out the fences once that morning. He saw her stop, unsheathe her katana, kill two Walkers through the fence, sling it clean, and re-sheathe it with the same nonchalant attitude that most people would swat a fly.

As he watched her, his mind drifted back to the night before… back to the thought of her, dripping wet and naked. Through the binoculars he studied her muscular shoulders, her tight ass, and he felt himself becoming aroused.

"Get it together, Daryl." He said out loud to himself, lowering the binoculars and trying to calm himself. "She wouldn't go for you. She probably wouldn't go for anyone anymore." Since the world had gone to shit a lot of people had pushed those things out of their minds. People were dropping like flies everywhere. Nothing was sure anymore and no one was safe. It was better to have as few attachments as possible. It just meant that when someone got killed and turned, it was easier to put an arrow through their brain.

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Michonne finished her inspection, and sure that there were no immediate threats, she headed for the watchtower, wondering who was on watch with her and hoping that someone had relieved Tyreese and Sasha. As she came through the door, she saw Daryl sitting there, his feet swinging over the edge. He didn't turn around when she came in.

"You know we have chairs." She said, sitting down in one of the chairs that they had put there for watch. "They aren't comfortable, but they're better than the floor." It was only then that Daryl turned to face her, looking surprised to see her.

"I'm fine here. I don't have to sit in a chair everywhere I go." He said, a little snappier than she was used to him speaking.

Daryl immediately realized his tone was harsher than he'd wanted it to be. He hadn't really meant to snap back at Michonne as much as he was afraid that he might somehow give away what he'd been thinking about through his voice. He didn't want her to run him through with her katana for thinking about what she'd look like after one of those bubble baths she mentioned.

"Hey, I'm sorry." He said. She shrugged.

"It's OK."

Usually Daryl didn't want much conversation. Sometimes when he got watch with someone like Carol he would sit and wish that she'd be quiet. Carol was very sweet, and he liked her a lot, but she tried too hard to keep him entertained when they were on watch together and often times it just got to be annoying trying to respond to everything she said and act interested when he really just didn't want to talk. It was different with Michonne, though. She hardly ever spoke, and that actually made him more interested in hearing what she had to say.

"Did you find any weaknesses on the fences?" He asked.

"Nothing too bad. The hole on the far left side doesn't look so sturdy. It'll hold against a few Walkers, but I don't think that patch would keep out any sizable herd." She said.

"We could make a run later…see if that hardware has wire. We can reinforce it in case a herd comes through." Daryl offered. He liked going on runs with Michonne. There really wasn't anyone else in the group that he felt as secure with as he did with her. She could hold her own against the Walkers and it made it feel less like he was babysitting and more like he was getting something done when they went out together. Then again, everyone had their favorite run partner.

"Yeah." She said. Michonne hated watch more than anything else. She did it because everyone in the group split the responsibility of watch, but the sitting still in one place for so long drove her crazy. Once she had been a lawyer and worked long hours behind a desk, but that had been in a life so long ago that it seemed like she hardly remembered it. She wasn't that person anymore. Now she felt better if she was doing something active. At least then she felt like she was really alive, really fighting back against all that was going on around her.

The thought of a run was pleasant to Michonne. It would get her out of the prison for a little while and they might even get some action while they were there.

Daryl wanted to keep talking. He wanted to know more about the other Michonne, the Michonne that he could actually imagine taking bubble baths. He wasn't sure how to start up a topic like that with her. She didn't talk about her life before everything started, and he really didn't pry. He didn't like talking about his life that much either, so he could understand. Still, he was curious to know what she'd been like. He realized he knew really nothing about her except her name, that she could wield a katana, and that she had once led around a couple of Walkers like they were pets.

"So everybody got pretty messed up last night…" He said. She didn't respond, just silently nodded a little. "Carol wasn't even up this morning." He said, offering a little more.

"Nobody was up when I got up either. They're probably all nursing wicked hangovers." Michonne said.

"Are you?" Daryl asked. He was thankful that she'd at least responded in some way other than to shrug or move her head. She had a pretty voice, whenever she allowed someone to hear it.

"No. I've got a little bit of a headache, but I didn't drink as much as everyone else. How about you?" Michonne responded.

"A little bit, but nothing I can't get over." Daryl said. He was stuck. He wasn't sure how to continue the conversation any further than where he had arrived at. "So have you never liked to drink or is it just now?" He immediately realized that it sounded like he was trying too hard. He wasn't good at talking to women. He really wasn't good at talking to beautiful women, and it was even worse if that woman was Michonne. Much to his surprise, though, she responded naturally and didn't think the question was strange.

"I think it's more now. I've never been a heavy drinker, but the last thing you need these days is to get caught by a bunch of Walkers when you can't even stand up straight." Michonne realized Daryl was trying very hard to have a conversation with her. In spite of herself, she almost smiled when she saw the flush of relief come over his face after she answered his question. Daryl Dixon was cute and kind of awkward. Michonne also had to admit that he was pretty hot, for a white guy. He wasn't her type, but then again her type had never worked out for her. Still, if he was anything like his brother, which he probably was, she should be thankful that he at least spoke to her like she had the ability to understand him.

"That's true, but it's pretty safe here." Daryl said, surveying the landscape again. There was a small patch of Walkers on one side of the fence, but not a big threat, and they didn't seem to be forcing their way in. They'd seen fewer and fewer as it started getting colder. "I'm starting to think they hibernate." He said.

"Just because it's fairly safe here, doesn't mean we should be getting too comfortable. Whether or not they hibernate, we need to get that fence reinforced before it's too late and they close in on us." Michonne said.

"We'll go first thing when Rick and Rachel take over watch." Daryl said. He turned away and smiled to himself, thinking about the lone run that they would take. She'd been talking to him more openly this watch than she had in the past, so maybe he could get her to open up a little more on the drive.


	3. Chapter 3

There really wasn't much to do in the car on a run except talk or gaze out the windows. There wasn't anything to see and no cars to pay attention to. Radio stations had been off the air for ages and the only time anyone heard music was if someone decided to sing. Daryl wasn't much of a singer, and he'd never heard Michonne sing. He was driving and kept casting glances in her direction. She was staring out the passenger side window at scenery she must have seen at least a dozen times in the past few days. They'd been on at least that many runs, as had a few others. The goal was to stock the prison with everything they could possibly need in case it became impossible for them to go later. If the winter was harsh and brought any kind of ice and snow with it, no one wanted to run the risk of running off the road and getting caught by a herd of Walkers.

"Damn, girl, I'm gonna go crazy if you don't say anything." Daryl said after a while. Michonne looked at him.

"Nothing much to say." She said.

"Tell me something, anything. How'd you learn to use a katana?" Daryl asked.

"We have all learned to do a lot of things since this started, out of necessity. I realized that I couldn't carry all the ammunition that I needed, and that I wasn't a very good shot, and I found a katana at one of the stores that I raided." Michonne said. "I just learned to use it by having to use it, I guess." Michonne looked at Daryl who was keeping his eyes on the road as if he had any kind of traffic to worry about. "Did you know how to use a crossbow going into this?" She asked.

"Yeah. I been huntin' since I was at least six. I always liked the bow better than a gun. It just made more sense, you know? It was like I it was more fair or something than the guns. I felt better when I hunted with it." Daryl said. Bingo. He'd found the sweet spot. Ask her about the katana that had essentially become her only friend and she'd open up…at least a little.

"Have you always hunted to eat or did you hunt for sport?" Michonne asked. Daryl seemed like the kind of guy who probably had a living room full of animals that he'd killed and stuffed for no reason. That kind of man never really appealed to her. They were just like the men who sat around bragging about how big their dicks were or how many women they'd slept with.

"Nah, I always ate what I killed. I didn't have the most reliable parents, so if you wanted food you had to get it yourself, ya know? It wasn't like I had no June Cleaver mom who had dinner on the table every night. Her dinner mostly came from a bottle." Daryl said. Michonne didn't respond. He didn't know if she didn't know what to say or if he had made her uncomfortable. "What about you? What did you do before all this shit started happenin'?" He pushed a little further to see how much she would tell him.

"I was a lawyer." She said. Michonne didn't want to talk about that life. The life before all of this was a life that was too full of disappointments and too full of things that weighed her down when she lingered on them. She didn't want to drag that weight back out and carry it around with her, especially not when they were going on a run.

"A lawyer, huh? You musta made a lotta money." Daryl said. He heard Michonne snort and glanced over to her.

"Yeah, I guess so. It's done me a world of good." She said. Daryl laughed.

"Yeah, you notice we don't go touching no cash registers when we go on runs. It ain't good for much these days." He agreed. Money had been the most important thing before. He could remember having spent most of his life worrying about it. How much did he have? How much could he get? What would happen if he didn't get enough? Nowadays there wasn't any use for money. Nobody paid for anything in cash. Anytime a payment was owed to anyone, it was probably owed in blood.

"It's only good if you're out of toilet paper." Michonne said. The thought of what her life was like…the thought of all the money she'd worked to make…it all seem wasted now. Now time was of the essence. Nothing was promised to you now like it had been back then. Back then she thought she was always promised tomorrow and had to prepare for it. The money was great. It would be used to send her daughters to college. College…neither of them would ever go to college, and in this world it wouldn't matter if anyone ever had. Everyone was equal now. It wasn't about what you knew that came out of books; it was what you knew about survival that mattered.

"That's true." Daryl said. Michonne had only offered him her job description. He didn't know if he should push it any further. He didn't like to talk much about his own past, but that was mostly because he felt like it wasn't much to be proud of. He'd spent most of his life as a deadbeat working odd jobs and promising himself he'd get his life together "tomorrow". Now the tomorrows were pretty much done, and none of it mattered anyway because he had shucked that life completely. He hadn't had a family, though somewhere in the back of his mind he'd always thought he'd have one someday. "Did you have a family?" He asked timidly.

"Of course I had a family. Everyone had a family at some point." Michonne shot back. Her tone was not the same jovial tone it had been before.

Daryl realized he had hit a soft spot. Maybe her family had been killed when all this happened, or maybe she'd had to see them go one by one. He knew the loss of his brother, though he hadn't been much, had been more than he wanted to admit. He decided not to push the issue and they continued in silence until they got to the town.

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"Looks quiet." Daryl said as he pulled up in front of the hardware store. This town had afforded them few Walkers, leaving them to believe that a herd must have passed through and picked up the majority of them.

"Yeah, well looks can be deceiving." Michonne said, getting out of the car. Daryl went first into the store and looked around. Everything seemed completely still and quiet. He could somehow feel Michonne only a few feet behind him, katana in hand and ready to strike. Once they had made a few rounds, looking down the aisles, they started packing bags with tools and supplies they might need for repairing things during the winter.

"I guess the wood and wire is out back." He said as they loaded the bags into the back of the vehicle. A lone Walker approached them and Michonne lopped its head in half without a word. She followed him around back where a few Walkers were roaming around aimlessly. He took out one of them with an arrow and before he could say anything, she hacked the other two to the ground. "You'll give a man a complex." He said, retrieving his arrow from the Walker he had taken down.

"Yeah, well, you've got to be quicker than that." Michonne said.

Daryl wasn't sure, but he thought he may have caught a glimpse of a smile from her. He wondered what she looked like when she smiled. He bet she had a beautiful smile and thought it was a shame that the life they led gave her so little desire to show it off. He always did like the way women looked when they smiled.

"Here's the wood and wire." He said.

"How are we going to take that back?" Michonne asked. The rolls of wire were far larger than she had anticipated and only the two of them were there.

"I'll bring the car around. We'll take a little wood in case we need it. We can use the wire cutters to cut some of the wire and make a smaller roll." Daryl offered.

While he brought the car around back, Michonne wiped out a few more Walkers that tried to saunter onto the scene. Something was different about Daryl Dixon today, but she couldn't put her finger on what exactly that was. Before all of this had happened, she might have thought he was acting differently because he was interested in her, but that couldn't be the case. His awkwardness had to be owing to something else. Maybe it was the slight hangover he'd confessed to having earlier? Daryl was with Carol, and Carol followed him around like a lovesick puppy. Of that Michonne was sure, but something was off. When Daryl got there they loaded up the wood first and then went to work trying to unroll the large rolls of wire to cut off just what they needed.

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Daryl was trying as hard as he could to shake the sudden, or not so sudden, interest that he had in Michonne. She didn't look at him that way. She didn't think of him that way. Still, while they were working so hard against the strongly coiled wire to roll out lengths that could be easily put in the back of the vehicle, he couldn't help but notice what she looked like, covered in sweat, almost as wet as he had seen her in his imaginings of her getting out of her bath. He had to keep shaking the image from his head in order to get the work done, and also to keep from showing exactly what he was thinking physically.

Finally enough wire was loaded, with only minor cuts on either side, that they could head back to the prison and confidently repair, for at least a little while, most of the holes that most concerned them in the fence. When they got in the car, both of them were covered in sweat and exhausted.

"What'cha say we fix the fence tomorrow?" Daryl asked, panting from the strain.

"I'm good with that. I think it'll hold through the night." Michonne said. She hated to admit but every muscle in her body ached from doing what had probably taken four men to do for the business between the two of them. She was ready to wash herself off and go to bed, even though it wasn't dark yet.

"I just hope someone else wants to unload tonight." Daryl said. Michonne agreed and they headed back to the prison with their spoils.


	4. Chapter 4

That night, Daryl tried to sleep. He tossed and turned on his pallet, unable to think about anything but Michonne. He thought about her in the bubble bath as he had the first night, and now he thought about her drenched in sweat as she had been during the run. Who was she? A lawyer? A hell of a lot that told him! From what he had known of lawyers in his life they'd always been greasy scumbags with no good merits. He couldn't believe that of the woman, and yes he realized now if he hadn't before that she was a _woman_, who had backed him up in quite a few sticky situations.

He didn't know what to do with himself, and he didn't know what to do with Michonne. He could finally admit that he was attracted to her, but what? Was he supposed to just bring that up to her? Maybe mention it over coffee? He hadn't had that kind of practice with women. Michonne was different than any other woman that he'd ever approached. Most of the women of his life before all this happened had been women who had more or less asked him to have sex with them. They dressed in ways, acted in ways, and insinuated in ways that they were interested. That wasn't Michonne. She hadn't shown that she was interested in much more than killing Walkers, except for the brief vulnerable moment when he'd seen her crying over Andrea.

He'd seen her crying over Andrea. The loss of someone she had come to love so deeply. He didn't feel too much for the loss of the annoying blonde, but it had broken his heart for a moment to see what Michonne was going through, and wondering what they had been through together…out there…alone.

Maybe that was it. Maybe he was totally wrong in thinking of Michonne as any kind of possibility in his life. Maybe it had been Andrea all along that she had been in love with. No wonder she'd been mourning the loss so greatly. He'd probably be wasting his time if he tried anything.

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Michonne tossed and turned, more than a little angry at her imagination, but there was nothing that she could do about it. It had been a long time since she'd been with a man. She hated that she secretly craved it so much, but she was dying to feel someone inside her…just to have a moment of release.

When she was with Andrea, there had been a few encounters. Beautiful and delicious though they had been, she had bid farewell to her friend, long before her death. Andrea had chosen the Governor over her quickly. She, not sure to do with such a loss, had tried to continue on and convince herself she'd be fine alone. She would have been, if it hadn't been for the Governor's henchmen wounding her alongside her desire to save her treacherous friend.

Now here she was. Andrea was gone. The life she knew before all of this was gone. Her whole past was erased. Nothing remained. Yet she felt a sweet spot. She wondered what Daryl was like. She wondered what it would be like to feel his muscular arms around her. She wondered what it would be like to feel him inside her. It had been so long since she'd felt a man inside her. Michonne turned over again, flipping her pillow on top of her head as if that would block out her thoughts. She didn't want to think about things that couldn't and weren't going to happen.

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Daryl couldn't get her out of his mind. He wondered what she'd do if he just approached her and came out with the truth. He'd been thinking about her. Time, these days, was limited. He just wanted to be with her once, to feel her under him…to have her let him know that he still existed and he was still a man. But how could he approach her with that?

Michonne wasn't that kind of woman…he was sure of it. She's sever him in half if he tried to make any kind of move on her that was uninvited, and she wasn't known for her inviting nature.

Still, he thought he might go insane if he wasn't able to figure out a way to approach the unapproachable. He could almost taste her sweet skin, and the images that haunted him threatened his sanity.

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Michonne struggled through the night, unable to really sleep. She was haunted by images of everything Daryl could be and should be in an alternate universe.

"In one where my skin doesn't disgust him." She growled to herself as she got out of bed and dressed herself in the darkness of her cell. "Forget it, and forget him." She said. "I don't need him."

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Regardless of his sleepless night, Daryl and Rick were up early in the morning mending patches in the fence with the wire they had brought back the day before, reinforcing the strength against determined Walkers, who given enough numbers, could plow down almost anything.

"I think it's gonna hold pretty good." Rick said. Daryl didn't respond. "Daryl, I said I think it's gonna hold pretty good." He repeated. Daryl was staring off at a distance at Michonne who was rambling through the courtyard and toward the gates.

"Oh, yeah, yeah." Daryl said. "That should do it." He barely glanced at the fence before his vision went back to Michonne who was now opening the gate. She stepped out and slaughtered a few Walkers with her katana. "What's the crazy bitch doing?" Daryl asked.

"Practice?" Rick offered.

"Maybe so, but she shouldn't go out there. Before she knows it more may be on her than she can handle." Without much more warning, Daryl left Rick finishing up the patch job and walked toward the part of the fence where Michonne stood ready with her katana for any approaching Walker. "Hey, what are you doing?"

"Just keeping sharp." She replied, trying to ignore the fact that Daryl was behind her, and safely behind the chain link fence.

"Don't ya know you can get killed like that? It especially ain't safe since we don't know when the Governor and his bad guys'll show up." Daryl said.

"I guess I was alright on my own before I found this group, it isn't like this is my first batch of Walkers." Michonne said, lopping the head off of another.

Daryl was frustrated, but realized he had no way of winning. "Suit yourself." He said. He didn't know why, but he desperately wanted her safely inside the gate. At the same time, however, he realized this was a woman that no one would ever cage.


	5. Chapter 5

Michonne wished she could look forward to breakfast, but it had been a while since she'd eaten anything truly delicious. When she joined Maggie, Rachel, and Beth at the dining table, she wasn't surprised when Carol handed her a plate with corned beef and clumpy oatmeal to be washed down by incredibly weak instant coffee. Culinary criticism had gone away completely since all of this happened, so these days it was eat whatever was put in front of you.

Michonne thanked Carol quietly and started chewing her breakfast, listening to Maggie and Rachel talk about weddings. Maggie and Glenn were going to get married. Michonne imagined it would be a beautiful ceremony. Everyone standing around in their dirty clothes, which Carol scrubbed clean occasionally, but they still carried the stench of up close Walker encounters. Everything these days smelled like Walkers. You couldn't wash the smell of death out of things. The ceremony would, no doubt, be the social event of the season. Michonne stifled a snicker.

Daryl sat down at the table and accepted his breakfast from Carol. "I wish there was more game." He said, stabbing remorsefully at the corned beef. "Maybe I'll go out hunting today." He said.

"We could have a nice dinner." Carol said, sitting next to Daryl. Michonne watched them across the table. They were the oddest couple at the prison. Glenn and Maggie were all cute and hopelessly in love with one another. Rachel and Rick and were so stuck to one another that they had essentially become Siamese twins. Carol and Daryl were different, though. Carol always looked at Daryl with the same look as a lovesick high school girl, but Daryl never seemed to return it much. Michonne couldn't remember ever having seen them even hold hands.

Michonne's musings were interrupted by the sound of Rick shouting "Walkers! Walkers!" from outside. She jumped up and ran with the rest of the group out to the courtyard. Everyone was scrambling in every direction. Some were running with Glenn to try to figure out where the Walkers had gotten in, and the others were trying to kill as many as possible. At least thirty hungry Walkers filled the courtyard.

"Nasty bastards." Michonne heard Daryl say as he sent an arrow through the head of an approaching Walker. She decided she wasn't in the mood to wait for them to come to her. Katana in hand she rushed and the herd, swinging. She took down five almost in one swipe. "Use the Force!" She heard Daryl call out behind her. She almost laughed. A herd this size was a threat if you were alone, but with all of them working together it was really just more like a wakeup call to get the morning started. Michonne wanted to get the group down as quick as possible. She might not like clumpy oatmeal, but she knew it was better if she got to eat it before it got too cold.

Once the Walkers were down, everyone started regrouping. There was a lot to be done now. The Walkers needed to be burned, and their presence indicated already that there was a weakness somewhere in the fence.

"Bad news." Rick said, walking up.

"Fence down somewhere?" Daryl asked him.

"Worse." Rick said. "Glenn's patching it up now, but the Walkers didn't take down the fence, it was cut."

"The damn Governor." Daryl said.

"Probably not in the flesh, but one of his toadies probably did it. I was on watch, but I never saw anyone. I just saw the Walkers flood in and thought one of the patches gave away." Rick looked concerned. Michonne didn't miss that he kept glancing at her. She could read body language pretty well and it was obvious that Rick still blamed her for all the trouble with the Governor.

"Well, we'll just have to be on the lookout for him." Daryl said. "If it's just one guy we shouldn't have too much trouble getting' rid of him."

Michonne left them talking and went back inside to finish her breakfast. When Daryl entered the room, he patted her on the arm.

"Good job out there." He said.

"Nice Star Wars pun." She responded. He smiled, and she caught herself smiling back at him.

"That's the first time I've seen you smile." He said.

"Not much to smile about." Michonne said.

"Well, keep doing it when you can. You have a nice smile." Daryl said. He immediately regretted it and felt himself blush. He looked down at his plate. _Smooth, Romeo_. He didn't want to look back up at Michonne to see how she had taken the comment. She was probably mocking him in her head right now.

Michonne was a little taken aback by Daryl's compliment. It was nice. It had been quite some time since a man had complimented her. Carol had shot her an unwelcomed look, but it wasn't like she had asked him for the compliment. She hadn't missed that he'd blushed afterwards. That made her smile again. It was cute how easily embarrassed he got. She tried not to let her mind think about the fact that she had really only seen him get embarrassed when he was talking to her. That was letting her imagination get the best of her.

Daryl got up from the table and took his crossbow. "I'm goin' huntin'." He said to no one in particular.

"I'll come with you." Michonne said, getting up. She noticed Carol shoot her another look. She ignored it.

"I don't think that's a good idea." Daryl said.

"Why not?" Michonne wanted to get outside the prison for a while, and she was somewhat interested in spending a little time with Daryl. Part of her wanted t find out if he thought that more about her was nice than just her smile.

"We still don't know who cut the fence." Daryl replied. "You don't need to go paradin' around behind me in the woods if someone out there is trying to kill you."

"Well, if someone wanted to kill me they could just as easily shoot me in the courtyard, and I'm not staying inside like some kind of grounded teenager just because of some asshole with a pair of wire cutters." Michonne countered.

Daryl didn't think it was the best idea to take her with him. He did worry about whoever was out there and what they were capable of, but he also knew by now that no one stopped Michonne from doing what she damn well pleased. That was, at the same time, the most annoying thing about her and the most appealing. She literally listened to no one unless she liked what they had to say. That meant she only ever did what you wanted her to do if she'd already made up her mind that what you wanted was also what she wanted.

That was one of the reasons that Daryl had never had the guts to try to kiss her or really even touch her in more than a "good buddy" slap on the back way. He was a little afraid of how she'd react if it wasn't what she wanted, and she wasn't exactly as easy to read as a Dr. Seuss book.

"Fine, come one, but it ain't my damn fault if you get yourself killed." He said. Michonne grabbed her katana and followed behind him.


	6. Chapter 6

"It's a damn shame." Daryl said, nudging a half eaten deer with his foot. "We could eat a hell of a lot better if those damn Walkers weren't chewing up all the game that's left. Michonne frowned at the animal before continuing forward. They had been wandering around for a while, but they hadn't seen anything. It was getting cold, though, so she didn't really expect the area to be crawling with animals.

"If we could find some healthy cows or something, we could breed them for food." She said. She'd thought about it before. Having milk that didn't come from powder would be nice.

"Who are you now? The farmer in the dale? And let's say we get us these amazing cows, what happens when the Walkers get in like this morning and they eat 'em? Then we just got a bigger mess to clean up and you'll be wantin' to go off lookin' for more stupid cows." Daryl said.

Michonne shrugged. "It was just a thought. Don't be so defensive." Daryl was jumpy. He had been since they got out there. Michonne thought that he was angry with her for having come along. Maybe he liked hunting by himself.

"Sorry, I'm just pissed about the deer." He said. "I'm sick to death of eating crap from a can."

"Me too. I can't remember the last time I ate a piece of fruit or a vegetable that was actually fresh." Michonne said.

"You're not likely to be doing it any time soon neither." Daryl watched Michonne walking ahead of him by a few feet. She seemed different out her than she had at the prison, or even on runs. Instead of her normal rigid stride, she was walking along easily, occasionally tugging off pieces of the higher weeds that could reach her hands. He half expected her to start skipping or something. He snickered a little at the image.

Michonne wasn't sure exactly how she was feeling right now. It was a feeling that she hadn't had in a while. She _wanted_ something, some reaction from Daryl, but she wasn't even really sure what that something was. She realized she was letting her guard down a little, but she was feeling a little more lighthearted than usual. It was peaceful out here, and even though they hadn't seen any game, they hadn't seen any Walkers either. For just a moment things were feeling somehow _normal_.

"So Carol didn't seem to like the idea of us coming out here." Michonne said, phrasing her statement more like a question. _You're flirting, and you know it. _

"What? What do she care?" Daryl asked. Carol was one of the weaker members of the group. Like Beth she mostly stayed at the prison and handled the day to day domestic chores. Outside of those walls she had to be taken care of, and in this atmosphere it was hard enough to take care of yourself, let alone anybody else. Daryl couldn't imagine that Carol had wanted to go hunting. She'd never expressed any interest in going before.

"Maybe she doesn't like the idea of her man going off in the woods with another woman." Michonne prompted. She knew what she was doing now. Maybe she was pushing it too far, but she was curious.

Daryl blushed. "What? Her man?"

"You mean you two aren't together?" Michonne asked. This _was_ interesting. Maybe there was a little more to Daryl's glances and his blushing than she had thought before.

"Nah. Me and Carol, we ain't like that." Daryl said. He hadn't realized that anyone would think they were. He cared about Carol, and she was probably the person he was closest to at the prison, but he just thought of her as something like a sister. She was so vulnerable that it felt like she needed him. Daryl had always liked feeling needed, it made up for all that time that he had spent feeling like nobody even wanted him around.

Then Daryl thought about it. Was Michonne trying to find out if he was with Carol because she was interested? It probably wasn't that, but it could be. For a moment Daryl wished that the whole relationship thing was as simple as it had been when he was in school. Then he could just pass her a note that said "Do you like me? Check yes or no." and that would be the end of it.

So Daryl said that he and Carol weren't together. They were like brother and sister. Michonne wondered if Carol knew that she was making puppy eyes at her "brother" all the time. Poor Daryl, he was pretty much clueless. Michonne realized that if she ever got up enough courage to decide to give it a shot with him, she was going to have to make the first moves. Daryl was not likely to pick up on subtle cues.

Something rustled in the bushes ahead of them and the both stopped.

"Probably a Walker." Michonne said, drawing her katana. "I've got this." She started walking toward the bushes.

"Hey, use the force." Daryl said, mimicking the phrase that had gotten a smile out of her earlier that day. Just as he had hoped, Michonne turned back and smiled at him again.

Daryl saw the gunman just a second too later. His arrow made its mark, but not before the gun went off. Lowering his bow, Daryl felt lightheaded. He felt like he couldn't quite process what had just happened. Finally he snapped out of it and rushed to Michonne, who was lying on the ground moaning.

"Are you OK? Where did he hit you?" He asked, kneeling beside her, frantically trying to find a bullet wound.

"I think he shot me in the ass." She said. Daryl rolled her to the side.

"Shit. Not quite. He got you in the thigh." Daryl took his shirt off and tied it around where the wound was, trying to stop some of the bleeding. "Damn it, we gotta get outta here. The smell of all this blood's gonna bring every Walker for miles." He put his crossbow and her katana on his back and then lifted Michonne as carefully as he could, but she still moaned in pain. "I'm sorry." Daryl said.

"I understand." She said.

Daryl wasn't full sure what he was going to do in this situation. He knew he had to get her back to the prison, and he knew it was a pretty good distance. He wished they hadn't rambled so far out. That bastard had probably been following them the whole time, waiting to get them out of screaming distance. Michonne wasn't as light as a feather, so he could only half jog at best. He knew that the motion had to be hurting her, but she didn't protest or complain. She knew that he had no other choice. He was essentially unarmed and the smell of the blood and sound of the gunshot would have gotten some Walker attention.

Michonne also realized how vulnerable Daryl was in this situation. Usually they walked around with their weapons ready because you never knew when to expect a Walker. Now not only did he not have his crossbow in hand, but he had his hands full.

"If Walkers get on us, drop me and run." Michonne said.

"Like hell! I ain't feedin' you to no damn Walkers!" Daryl grunted.

"Don't be a hero, Daryl. It doesn't make sense for both of us to get killed because you were trying to save me. I know how things go these days. If we see Walkers, just let me go."

"Shut up, Michonne. You're heavier when you talk." Daryl said. He continued on, praying that he wouldn't have to find out what would happen in that situation.

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They had gotten lucky. They'd only seen one Walker along their path and it had been more interested in the animal that it was eating than it was in chasing after them. Daryl had actually been thankful to see a Walker chewing on something he might have shot for dinner. Whoever was on guard must have spotted them coming because as they neared the prison gates Maggie and Glenn were outside taking down the few Walkers that came near them and Rick slid the gate open to let Daryl slip in.

"Is she bit?" Rick asked as Daryl ran into the gate and continued toward the prison.

"Shot." Daryl said. He was out of breath and his arms were killing him. He didn't have time right now to chat with Rick. Rick jogged along beside him.

"What the hell were you thinking, Michonne? You went out there knowing the Governor wants you dead!" Rick was angry, that much was obvious.

"Damn, Rick, get off her man! She's the one shot and you're acting like it's you who's got a bullet in the leg." Rick stopped and Daryl went ahead into the prison. "Hershel! Hershel!" He called until he found the old man.

"What we got?" Hershel asked, hobbling out from the kitchen.

"Gunshot wound." Daryl said. He followed Hershel into the room that he had dubbed his exam room and put Michonne on the table. "It's her upper thigh on the right side." Daryl wanted to sit down. He was exhausted.

"You're gonna have to help me out." Hershel said. Beth came in a few minutes later, having obviously heard all the commotion. "Daryl, help me get her pants off and roll her over." Hershel and Beth went to work getting the supplies he would need to take care of this.

_Help me get her pants off? Help me get her pants off. It was a simple request from Hershel…just take off her pants. _Daryl stood there a moment, really not sure what to do. He couldn't very well say, "I'm sorry Hershel, but I'm just not comfortable with that right now." No, he wasn't really in that position.

Michonne was in searing pain, the kind that made her want to vomit, and every time she moved at all she felt like she was tearing the hole in her leg even bigger. Still, through the pain, she had to admit that the look on Daryl's face was priceless. He looked like a ten year old boy who has just been told he has to use the ladies' room. For encouragement she unbuttoned and unzipped her pants, hoping he'd realize that it wasn't anything personal, it was really all about bullet lodged in her thigh.

After Michonne unbuttoned her pants, Daryl noticed that she gave him an impatient look of "what are you doing?" so he took the cue and helped get them off. He helped turn her over as gently as possible. He really meant not to look at her, out of respect, but he couldn't help it.

Hershel asked Daryl to hold her legs down while he worked. Daryl leaned across her legs and stared at the wall. She was wearing lace panties. What had she done, raided a Victoria's Secret? Granted, he hadn't really seen any panties since this whole thing started, but he hadn't imagined that the women were running around in lace panties stabbing Walkers in the eye with screwdrivers and shit. Shit, here she was getting a bullet dug out of her, and all he could do was think about her panties. This was pathetic. He'd better hurry up and stop thinking about them, stop thinking about seeing her in them, or there was going to be no way he could deny that he had looked.

"I guess you were lucky that guy's aim wasn't so great." Hershel said, making conversation as he worked. "It's not even a bad wound. The bullet came out easy enough. I've just got to sew it up now. You'll be back on your feet in a couple of days." Daryl wasn't looking in Hershel's direction, for obvious reasons, but he realized Michonne wasn't in the mood right now to respond to Hershel's comments. She hadn't put up much of a fight, but Daryl could clearly feel the tension in her legs, and she had involuntarily jumped a few times.

"I don't think his aim was bad." Daryl said.

"What do you mean? If he had the opportunity to shoot her, why didn't he shoot her in the head?" Hershel asked.

"The Governor doesn't want her dead. He thought he caught us completely off guard. He thought he could wound her, probably kill me, and take her back to the Governor that way." Daryl said. If he hadn't been distracted, he probably would have seen the guy before he ever even got off this shot, but he _had_ _been distracted._

"Well, it's not a fatal wound, and she was lucky you were there to keep him from taking her." Hershel said. "And you, Michonne, are patched up. Just stay on bed rest for a few days, and you should be pretty close to new. You'll need to take it easy for a bit, but this isn't going to put you completely out of commission.

"Nothing puts Michonne out of commission." Daryl said with a snort. He finally stood up, and though he promised himself he wouldn't look again, he did. He coughed and looked away.

"Daryl, can you carry her to her cell?" Hershel asked.

"Without pants?" Daryl asked.

"Everyone's outside anyway, and I'm not modest." Michonne offered. She struggled to take the Tylenol that Beth offered her. It wasn't easy lying on her stomach. She was sure it would do a world of good for the pain she was in right now, but she'd take anything she could get.

Daryl carried Michonne back to her cell and put her in her bed as gently as he could. "Hey, I'm sorry you got shot." He said as he helped cover her with a blanket.

"It's not your fault. Thank you for saving me." Michonne said.

"Anytime." Daryl left and Michonne tried to sleep.


	7. Chapter 7 (edited)

AN: I am so very happy that some of you seem to be enjoying the story. I hope as I go along I don't let you down. I'm just letting it play out to see where it goes. I have distinct plans for the future, but I'm enjoying seeing how they get there just as much as you are. I apologize again for the riddling of spelling and grammar errors. My computer doesn't always catch them and I type very quickly when I'm excited about what I'm writing.

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"What's wrong with you?" Sasha asked. She was on watch with Daryl and had been on watch with Daryl for the past two hours and he hadn't stopped fidgeting since they'd gotten there. He would sit a moment, get up, wander around the tower, sit again. It was making Sasha dizzy just from watching him.

"Ain't nothin' wrong with me." He growled. He wasn't in the mood to talk to Sasha. He didn't know her well yet, and he wasn't really happy about being on watch with her, so he didn't want her bothering him.

"You can talk about it, if you want." She said. She didn't know Daryl Dixon very well. From what she had seen, he was just the quiet, rugged type that liked to be left alone. She didn't see him as being the nervous kind, though, and he certainly seemed nervous right now. She wondered if it was something going on between him and Carol, since she was pretty sure that they were dating.

"Ain't nothin' to talk about. I just said there ain't nothin' wrong with me." Daryl snapped. He sat down on the floor and leaned back against the wall, biting at a piece of skin on his thumb. "It's just bein' up here, in this box. It's gettin' me claustrophobic." He added, hoping the explanation would satisfy Sasha.

Sasha knew he was lying. You didn't make it this long in this crazy world without learning how to read people at least a little and he had been fidgeting long before the claustrophobia of the watch tower would have set in.

"Relationship trouble?" Sasha asked, nonchalantly. Daryl stopped biting at the skin, but didn't look at her.

"Huh?" He asked.

"Is it a problem with you and Carol?" Sasha asked. He wouldn't have frozen at her first question if she weren't somewhere around the mark. Maybe if she got him to talk about it he would calm down a little.

"What?" Daryl looked at her then. "Why the hell does everyone think that Carol is my girl?" He asked.

Sasha was confused. From her first night there she had figured out that Glenn and Maggie were together. It was also pretty obvious that Daryl was with Carol. The others were unattached, at least until the romance between Rick and Rachel fired up. That hadn't been hidden at all. The cots in the prison squeaked, and the squeaking echoed. It reminded Sasha of the sound that her hamster's wheel had made at night when he'd run furiously in it. There weren't any hamsters in the prison, but sometimes it sounded like the place was overrun with them.

"I just thought…" She started. Daryl cut her off.

"Well you thought wrong. Shit, I gotta get out of this box." He said. He stood up. "I'm goin' to check the fences. Will ya be alright here?"

"Sure, nothing's happened today anyway.

!

Daryl circled the prison, checking the fences. He knew they were fine. He'd checked them all a couple of hours ago and they had only seen maybe eight Walkers in that time. It didn't have a thing to do with the fences, and it didn't have a thing to do with Carol neither. It had to do with lace panties and the fact that his stupid mind couldn't seem to shake the image. He saw it at night, he saw it when he was eating breakfast, and he saw it when he was supposed to be on watch. The only damn thing he could think about was Michonne's lace panties. It was driving him crazy. Why couldn't she have worn some damn nasty looking granny panties? That would have been a lot easier for him to get out of his mind.

"Fuck this!" Daryl said to himself, kicking the fence. He whistled at a nearby Walker who was coming toward him. He stabbed it through the fence. "And fuck you." He said to the dead Walker. He felt a little better, maybe he'd pick off the other ones that were sauntering around the fence.

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"Bored, bored, bored, bored…" Michonne had started talking to herself. It hadn't been a very enthralling conversation. She didn't have much to talk to herself about right now. For the past three days she'd been lying in her cell, on her stomach, staring at the dirty floor. The only people she had seen were Hershel who occasionally came in to check her wound and every time declared that "soon she'd be on her feet," and Beth who brought her food three times a day, regardless of the fact that she wasn't really hungry.

She'd give anything for a book to read; even it was the phone book, or someone to visit. Even though she liked to be alone, right now she was dying for even one of Beth's annoying stories or Maggie's ramblings about how sweet Glenn was. What she really wanted was for Daryl to visit her, but she hadn't seen him since this whole thing happened.

The prison was probably all talking about. They were probably laughing about Michonne got shot in the ass. It was embarrassing. _I got shot in the ass because I was too busy flirting with a guy to pay attention to what was around me. _Flirting with a guy who didn't care enough to stop in and ask how she was. Flirting with a guy who obviously didn't care at all…Daryl had saved her, but that was something he'd have done for anyone. It was something she'd have tried to do for anyone to. It hadn't meant anything.

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Daryl had thought about going to see Michonne, but then he'd figured that it didn't make much sense. She wasn't the kind of woman that expected people to visit her. She'd always liked to be alone. She liked quiet. She'd probably just be annoyed that he was bothering her when she wanted to rest.

He'd asked Hershel over breakfast how she was doing for the past two days. Rick had called him out on it, declaring that "a gunshot wound to the ass wasn't fatal, so why worry about it". He knew it wasn't fatal. He didn't expect something as simple as that to ever kill Michonne. She wasn't that kind of person. He wasn't even sure she was mortal sometimes. He decided then he'd stop asking. He knew that Rick wasn't fond of her anyway.

He wanted to go see her, but he couldn't figure out what he would open with…it seemed like it had all been said before. When he searched his mind for something to say, all he got was the image of her lace panties. Even wounded she'd probably kill him if she knew he was thinking about her panties.

Daryl stabbed another Walker, the last one he could see in the area, and started back to the box. Sasha was still there and they still had another hour of watch. He just hoped she didn't feel chatty this time when he went up.

!

Sasha had watched Daryl pick off each of the straggling Walkers that were roaming around the fences. This was a man that was obviously frustrated, but Sasha was perplexed at this point. Nothing was going on around the prison. In fact, it had been the quietest few days that she could remember. No Walkers had gotten in and nothing had really happened. The only thing she could attribute this kind of frustration to was some kind of issue with a lover, but Daryl had just made it quite clear that he wasn't in a relationship.

When she saw him coming back toward the tower, she sighed and sunk back in her chair. Another ten minutes of him pacing around the tiny space and she might decide to throw herself off.

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"Anything happen?" Daryl asked as he came back through the door. He knew it hadn't, but he felt like he owed Sasha something. She was a nice girl, a little smart-mouthed at times, but nice.

"Nothing except that you just killed the few Walkers that were giving me something to watch. Now it's like watching static on the television." She said. "You still don't want to talk about it?"

"I told you I ain't got nothin' to talk about. Damn, why do you women always think you gotta talk about shit?" What did she want? What did she expect? Was he supposed to sit down and talk with her like a bunch of giggling teenagers? Even if he'd known her better, he couldn't tell Sasha what he was thinking. What was he going to say? _Oh, you know, I was just sitting here thinking about Michonne's lace panties…and the fact that I'd take them off with my teeth if I thought she was into that… _"Damn nosy bitch." He added, somewhat under his breath.

Sasha didn't take his comment to heart. It was obvious something was troubling him, but it was also pretty obvious that he wasn't going to share it with her and prying only made him more annoyed. She decided she'd leave it alone and try to ride out the rest of the watch without wanting to kill him for his antics.


	8. Chapter 8

"Well, look who's on watch." Daryl said as Michonne limped into the tower.

"Yeah, how about that." She replied. She hadn't known she was going on watch with Daryl. She might have waited to request someone else if she'd known it was going to be him. Hershel had finally given her at least the OK to do some minor tasks, and she was urgent to get out of her cell.

"How ya feelin'?" Daryl asked. He hated to admit that he still felt guilty about the wound she had suffered. If he'd been quicker, it would never have happened.

"OK, I guess." She said, trying to settle into one of the chairs in the most dignified way possible.

Daryl tried to figure out how to continue the conversation, chewing nervously at his cuticles. "You know, I wouldn't have left you out there." He offered.

Michonne was a little shocked. "Thank you." She said. She'd already thanked him once, but his behavior showed that he might need it more than once. She decided to chalk it up to his earlier comment about his mother. Maybe he hadn't been thanked enough in his life.

"I was worried." He said, still glancing off at the distance, even though there were maybe ten Walkers to be concerned about.

"I'm fine." She said. What was it going to take? Did she need to send this person a stamped invitation inviting him to interact with her in order to get more than Walker talk? He clearly wasn't interested.

"I'm glad." He said. He finally turned to look at her. God, she was overwhelming to him. She was perfect. Everything about her was perfect. He wanted so bad to say that she was all he'd been thinking about. She was all that he could think about…but how would she take that? Michonne wasn't the sentimental type.

Daryl was clearly uncomfortable and unsure of himself. Michonne had never seen him like this before, but she recognized the signs. Maybe there was some hope there. Maybe he wasn't the same kind of narrow minded prick his brother had been

"I mean it, I'm really thankful that you saved me." She offered.

Daryl looked at her with an expression that she'd never seen in her entire life. It was desperate almost, and thankful at the same time. It was like she'd just done him a favor she could never repeat. He didn't respond, though, at least not verbally.

"Are you OK?" She asked. He nonchalantly answered her, biting so furiously at his fingers that she expected to see blood. If there was a time to test his reactions, she decided, now was the time. "I'm serious, without you I wouldn't have made it back to the prison. I owe my life to you." Michonne said.

Daryl knew what the Governor would have done to her. It disgusted him to think about it. The Governor's plans for her probably didn't include an ounce of humanity within them. He wasn't going to let that happen. No one deserved that fate, and Michonne certainly didn't.

"I'm fine." He said. He didn't know what else to say at this point.

"Daryl?" Michonne challenged…realizing she may be out of line completely, but not really caring for the moment. "Would you mind if I repaid you?" She asked.

"What you mean?" Daryl asked. He didn't really want repayment. He didn't want anyone trying to save his ass.

Michonne decided she was done with the game from her side. She was going to make the first move. If he responded she'd go from there. If he didn't, that was still the truth. She struggled to her feet and planted a kiss on his lips.

The kiss was long and lingering. It was unlike anything that Daryl had ever felt before. Kissing was something he'd done on his arm before high school and on girls that wanted nothing more than sex afterwards. The kiss from Michonne was different. It was a kiss that felt like the kiss was all that mattered. He didn't quite know how to respond, or know that he had even responded correctly, thought he had followed her lead the best he could and returned it.

Michonne pulled away from the kiss. He had responded, though not with the level of enthusiasm she had hoped for. Still, Daryl had a long way to go, in her opinion, and his response hadn't been as dramatically different from what she responded to lose all hope.

"Did you mean for that to happen?" Daryl asked after a minute or two had passed.

"Did you like it?" She asked.

"I mean, it was good. Did you mean for it to happen?" He asked again. He was in shock. The kiss was electrifying to him, but he knew that these days people did things out of reaction to their environment. They didn't necessarily want them to be taken the way that they might have been taken before. Maybe she'd kissed him because of the wound. Maybe she kissed him because she thought about how close she had come to maybe being shot in the head.

"Other than a few bullet wounds, not much happens to me these days that I don't mean to happen." Michonne said, trying to take her seat as nonchalantly as possible.

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Daryl spent most of the watch silent. He didn't know what to do. Should he kiss her back? Should he initiate more? Was it just her way of saying thank you? He sat on the floor, his back against the wall,, wishing something or anything would happen so he'd have an excuse to leave before someone else got there.

´Michonne didn't know what to do. Daryl had somewhat responded to the kiss, opening his mouth and accepting her tongue at the end, but now he was acting like a nervous school boy. Had the kiss freaked him out, or had she freaked him out? She didn't really know what to do other than keep quiet and keep watch, hoping he'd give some indication about whether he'd liked the kiss or if her suspicions were correct and he wanted her to leave him alone. She sat in her chair, hugging her katana between her knees, and wishing Daryl wasn't silently brooding in his corner and chewing annoyingly on his cuticle.


	9. Chapter 9

AN: So here we go…there may be another update or two today since I'm just taking it easy for the day. Tomorrow it's back to work so the updates will be less frequent. I'll shoot for one a day, but we'll see what happens. I hope you are still enjoying it!

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Watch had been pretty much a silent experience. Michonne was uncomfortable. She never should have been so forward, and now she couldn't take it back. Maggie and Glenn had relieved Michonne and Daryl, letting them know that dinner was ready, and making idle chitchat about how Michonne felt and how she was healing up.

As they exited the tower, Michonne noticed Daryl heading for the kitchen, silent. She didn't really care about dinner. From what she had seen from the tower it just looked like soup and she wasn't too hungry. It would be more humiliating than it was worth to sit around the table with everyone and know they were probably mocking her…and it would be even worse to sit there across from Daryl and enjoy even more of the awkward silence she'd been subjected to in the watch tower. She decided to head back to her cell and call it an early night. She didn't want the solitude of the cell, but she didn't want the comradery of the dinner table either.

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Daryl felt tired and confused. He felt more tired after watch than he'd felt in a while. Michonne was brooding, and he knew it was because of the kiss. Here they were at the end of the world and he still didn't know how to respond to a woman like Michonne kissing him. She had said she wanted to repay him. He'd saved her ass and she'd kissed him, like her knight in shining armor, and that was it. That's what he was, just a knight in shining armor that had saved her ass a few times.

Daryl accepted his bowl of soup from Carol gratefully. Carol, sipping soup from a coffee mug, leaned back against the counter and watched him. Rick was talking about supplies and what else they needed to get to be stocked for the winter, but Daryl didn't seem to be listening to him. He glanced at him occasionally, but his main focus seemed to be the soup. It wasn't anything special, just chicken noodle, but he seemed like that was the only thing important to him. Carol wondered if something was wrong. He hadn't been the same since Michonne's accident a few days before.

_It's only natural._ Carol thought. Every time the group lost someone it was the same. It was a nagging reminder that this was only temporary. As hard as they had tried, this prison wasn't really a home. It was just temporary. They were essentially all just waiting to see who would be next. Everyone dealt with that reality in their own way. Maggie and Glenn dealt with it by banding together and trying to paint a picture of some beautiful life they were going to have together, trying their best to ignore that at any moment one of them could just disappear. Rick kept his mind off of things by worrying. He worried about everything but what he was actually worried about. He worried about the fences. He worried about the Governor. He worried about the supplies. He worried about anything except the end. Carol could understand that. Since she had lost Sophia, nothing had been the same for her either. That had been her wakeup call. The life they had known was gone and there wasn't really any hope of getting it back. Her entire focus now was taking care of her family. _This family._ This makeshift bunch of people who would probably have never fit together before all of this. And then there was Daryl…Carol liked taking care of Daryl more than anyone else around there. He was so grateful for everything. He acted like any kindness that you offered him was the greatest kindness in the world. Carol liked that appreciation. If there was a future in all this, she could see it being one that she spent with Daryl. At night sometimes she imagined what it would be like to return to a normal life, and her new life always looked the same. It was a happy suburban life, like something she'd seen on television, and it always included Daryl.

"Where's Michonne?" Hershel asked. Everyone looked at each other like no one had noticed until now that she wasn't eating dinner.

"Maybe she wasn't feeling well?" Beth offered. "It was her first day up."

"I hope I didn't push her to get up too soon." Hershel said. "She seemed to be doing well, though, and she was eager to get out. Who was on watch with her?"

"Daryl was." Beth said. Daryl looked at her and then looked at Hershel, barely raising his head from staring at the soup he was eating.

"Did she seem OK on watch?" Hershel asked.

"Yeah." Daryl said quickly. "Probably just tired."

"I'll take her some soup in a little bit." Carol said.

"I can take her some." Daryl offered. He put his spoon down. "I'm done anyway, and I'm tired so I'm going to head to bed."

Daryl got up and accepted a mug of soup from Carol.

"Have a good night." Carol said, putting her hand gently on Daryl's arm. Daryl mumbled a goodnight to her, assured Rick that he would help him tomorrow with whatever it was he was asking him about, and left the kitchen.

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Daryl felt like his heart was going to explode. It was difficult to breathe, and he wished he hadn't eaten so much of that soup. Why had he volunteered to bring the soup to Michonne? It had been bad enough trying to get through watch without knowing what to say or do. Now he was walking right into the lion's den.

He got to her cell and took a deep breath. "Michonne?" He said, looking inside. She was lying on her bed, and he couldn't tell if she was asleep or not. "You awake?"

"Yeah." She grunted. She struggled to sit up.

"Can I come in? I brought you some soup." Daryl said.

"Come on." She said. Daryl timidly walked into her cell and offered her the soup. She took it like the peace offering he obviously intended it to be and put it on the table next to her bed. She looked at the table a little ashamed. Her entire living space had pretty much been reduced to a 6 by 8 box and she realized she hadn't even kept it very tidy.

It was dark in the cell, but it was light enough for Daryl to tell that Michonne was scowling at him. The wrinkle between her eyes gave it away. Daryl sat gently on the bed next to her.

"You need to eat." He said. She didn't respond or make any move toward the soup she had put on the dresser. Daryl's stomach churned. "Listen, uh…I umm…about what happened in the tower…" He lowered his voice. Everything echoed here and he didn't want to risk embarrassing Michonne if she didn't want anyone to know what had happened.

"Forget about it." Michonne said. "I shouldn't have…"

Daryl interrupted her. "No, I mean it was good. I mean, I liked it. It's just that…" He didn't really know what to say.

"Just what?" Michonne asked. Here it was, the "it's not you, it's me speech" which almost always translates into "it's all about you." Michonne waited for it, a little sad that she had ever let herself get her hopes up. If she hadn't let the wall down, this wouldn't have mattered at all. Instead she was going to spend the rest of the night with her feelings hurt.

"Well, I…I'm just out of practice at this kind of thing." Daryl said quickly. He winced a little, not knowing what she was going to say or do. To his surprise the wrinkle on her forehead deepened for a moment, and then vanished. She was _smiling_ at him. He smiled back.

_A little out of practice!_ She'd been creating all these detailed speeches that Daryl was going to give her about how he wasn't into her. She'd mulled over about a half a dozen scenarios since she had planted the kiss on his lips. None of which had even involved in the slightest that he would sheepishly offer her watery soup and then declare that he was "out of practice" with things like kissing. He wasn't rejecting her at all.

"Hey, there's my smile." Daryl said. Michonne wondered if he could hear her heart pounding. She hadn't felt like this since she was in high school. She leaned in to kiss him again and found, happily, that he returned the kiss entirely. They separated for a moment and Daryl watched as Michonne chewed her bottom lip, looking up at him with her doe eyes. He smiled again, this time he kissed her. He didn't want the kiss to end. Part of him was afraid that once it ended it would never happen again. The other part didn't know what to do. He knew what he wanted to do, but he didn't know if they were ready for that, or even if that's where this was going.

When they finally broke apart from the kiss, they looked at each other a little awkwardly.

_This isn't the first time you've kissed someone._ Michonne thought to herself. But it was the first time she'd kissed someone _like Daryl. _The men in her life had pretty much always been forceful, sometimes excessively so, with what they wanted. They were the kind of men that when they kissed you, you knew exactly what their next move was. Michonne wasn't even sure if Daryl _had_ a next move. It was obvious that the kiss had been about all that he could handle for the night.

Daryl cleared his throat and stood up. "Well, goodnight." He said.

"Goodnight, Daryl." Michonne said. Daryl turned and started out of the cell, stopping just as he got to the door and turning back.

"And, uh…eat your soup." He added, just as he stepped out of the cell.

He didn't see Michonne smiling at him that time, but she was.


	10. Chapter 10

"Hey, Daryl, I've got a run for you." Rick said, catching up with Daryl in the courtyard. Hershel wants you to clean out what you can get from that pharmacy. No one's hit it yet and he's running low on supplies. That's an important area for us to cover.

"Yeah, ok, I'll go." Daryl said.

"Take someone with you for backup, just in case." Rick said. "I'm sure we can spare Glenn or somebody."

"I'll take Michonne." Daryl said. It was nothing unusual. Everyone knew he liked doing his runs with her.

"Are you sure she's up to it, Daryl?" Rick asked. "She hasn't been up and about much in the past few days."

Daryl hadn't seen Michonne since the kiss that night. Honestly he'd been avoiding her. He had no idea what to do about her. It wasn't like he could offer to take her out to dinner, or take her to a movie. How was he supposed to move forward with this when they couldn't even have any privacy at all to even talk about it? It seemed like there was always someone breathing down his neck.

"Nah, she'll be fine. It's a pharmacy run, and that towns pretty well cleaned out as it is. I could go on my own if I had to." Daryl said. He knew that Rick was right. He knew that his request didn't make any sense to Rick because it didn't make any sense at all. He was choosing to take an injured person on a run with him. It was like choosing to take the weakest link. Still, he was confident that he could practically make the run on his own, and he _needed_ to take her with him this time.

Rick shrugged. "Whatever…take whoever you want, but you better get started if you don't want to run out of light before you get back.

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Michonne knew why Daryl was taking her on this run. He hadn't said anything, but she knew it wasn't because she was the best option. She was healing, that much was true, but she wasn't back to her old self entirely. She was still sore and had a funny sort of hobble to her walk. Daryl wasn't taking her for backup, he was taking her because he hadn't been able to even speak to her since they kissed and he was hoping that getting away from the prison would make it easier. Michonne knew that, and she was grateful. She wanted to get out of the prison, and she wanted to be alone with Daryl.

Daryl wasn't talking in the car and it was obvious he was nervous. He kept drumming his hands on the steering wheel in quick spurts of energy. Michonne watched him out of the corner of her eye. His insecurity was endearing, but at the same time she realized that she was going to have to be in control. If anything was going to happen between them, it wasn't going to be Daryl who initiated it. She reached over and put her hand on his knee without saying a word. Daryl squirmed a little, but didn't say anything.

Her hand was warm on his leg. She had placed it there so naturally. Daryl hadn't expected something as simple as this to be so amazing. He was getting turned on just by having her hand on his leg. That's what this life had turned them into now. It had turned them all into people that were so detached from everything that even something as simple as a beautiful woman putting her hand on your leg felt like the most intimate thing possible. He swallowed, and took his hand off the steering wheel, placing it on top of hers. Her fingers curled around his hand.

They were going to raid a pharmacy for supplies they might need to help their "family" survive the winter. They would most likely encounter at least one or two Walkers during the trip, and he would put an arrow through one's brain, and she would run the other through with her katana, and they would congratulate each other on their kills. That's how the day would go, but right now they were holding hands. The humor of the situation didn't escape Michonne, but she liked holding his hand. It felt right. Holding hands was something, at least.

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"All clear." Daryl called out. The pharmacy was abandoned and there had been only one Walker outside. "I'm telling you, I think the damn things are hibernating somewhere."

"Let's just hope we don't find out where." Michonne said, stepping through the door. Someone had busted it out; the pharmacy wasn't as untouched as they thought it might be.

They looked around, walking up and down the aisles before they started packing bags with things that might be useful. It was one of those small town pharmacies that stocked a little of everything. Michonne took a bag and went back to the prescription area, putting everything she could see into the bag. She didn't know what any of it was, but it could be useful.

"It was Glenn and Maggie." Daryl called out to her.

"What?" She responded.

"It was Glenn and Maggie. They were the ones that broke in the door." Daryl said.

"Why do you say that?" Michonne asked, zipping up her bag and coming back around to help him finish filling sacks.

"'Cuz the only thing missing is a whole shelf of condoms and a rack of chocolate. The little assholes are sitting in their cell eating their stash of candy and fucking like jackrabbits." He said with a snicker.

"You gotta keep your strength up somehow." Michonne said. "You know…there might not be anymore condoms, but there is a little chocolate over there." She raised her eyebrow at Daryl and prayed that he wasn't going to make her spell it out to him. The quick increase in his breathing let her know that he might have picked up on her hint.

Daryl was pretty sure that he knew what Michonne was getting at. Suddenly he felt like he was facing his first time again. Michonne overwhelmed him to the point that he couldn't think very well when she was around, and now that she was looking at him like that, in a way he'd only allowed himself to even imagine once or twice, he wasn't even sure if he could remember what the hell to do in these situations. He broke eye contact with her and looked around. One thing was for sure, if they were going to do this, they were going to do it right. He wasn't making her get down on this filthy floor.

Daryl walked away without saying anything. Michonne stood there a minute trying to figure out what was going on. He called out to her and she picked up the bag from the floor beside her and walked around trying to find him. What she saw when she found him made her smile. He had found blankets, and he had piled several of them up on the floor.

"You know how to treat a girl right." She said, dropping the bags and taking off her katana. Daryl gave her a crooked smile and blushed a little.

"The floor was dirty." He said. Daryl didn't make a move, so Michonne sighed and took off her shirt. She unsnapped her bra and dropped it on the floor.

_This is actually happening._ Daryl thought. While he'd been arranging the blankets he had kind of thought that he was going to wake up or something and this would have all been a dream, but it wasn't and Michonne was standing in front of him, half naked…he felt frozen, like he couldn't move. This wasn't a dream, it was a nightmare. He was about to embarrass himself completely because he felt like he had no idea what to do. _Snap out of it! She's going to think you're an idiot! _

Michonne took off her pants. Daryl was just standing there. He was visibly sweating and looked like he might hyperventilate. Michonne was fighting hard not to laugh at him, worried that laughing at him would most likely make him run away right now, and she didn't want that. She walked up to him and kissed him while she fumbled with the button on his pants.

"You can touch me if you want." She said, barely moving her lips away from his. "It's going to work out a lot better that way." She had never done this before. She'd never had to be the one in charge, and she had to admit that it was turning her on even more than the prospect of the sex they were probably going to have if she could ever get that damn button undone.

Daryl snapped out of his trance a little and kissed her again. She looked down and he realized she was desperately trying to unbutton his pants with little success. He took the cue and shucked them himself. He couldn't get his boot off. There was a knot in the lace and he sat down on the pallet he had made to try and get it off. Finally he yanked it off and took his shirt off. Michonne lowered herself to the pallet beside him.

Daryl snickered. "How come people in movies never had this much trouble?"

Michonne laughed at him. "It doesn't matter."

Even if Daryl wasn't the smoothest man on the planet, it didn't take an expert to tell he was extremely turned on right now. Now that all of the obstacles were out of the way, he was beginning to loosen up a bit as well. Finally he took some initiative and Michonne gladly handed the reigns over to him. He kissed her, and cupping her breast he pushed her down onto the pallet. She winced and he remembered that he had to be mindful of her right leg. Daryl moved a hand between her legs, and Michonne bucked.

"Don't worry about that." She panted. "I'm ready." Daryl could tell that she was ready. There was no mistaking that she was already going there in her mind, and he had to admit that it was driving him crazy. He wasn't sure how long he was going to be able to hold it together. He pushed into her and she moaned, her fingers digging into his back.

"You OK?" He asked, trying hard to think about anything else besides the situation. He didn't want to embarrass himself and end this coupling this quickly.

"Give me a second; it's my first time in a long time too…" Michonne said. She hadn't really imagined that Daryl would feel as big as he did, and it had been an uncomfortable surprise.

"We may not have much longer than that." Daryl said apologetically. Michonne understood him and bucked her hips in response.

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Daryl had not underestimated his ability to hold out. Michonne hadn't minded. She had expected that it being his first time in probably a very long time, that it wasn't going to be the sexual encounter of the century, but she hadn't expected him to take it so bad. He was lying on the blanket next to her, sulking.

"You know some people cuddle after sex." She said.

"I'm sorry." Daryl said. He was mortified. He wanted to impress Michonne, but he was pretty sure instead he had given her about two minutes of the worst possible sex imaginable. The only thing that surprised him was that she seemed lighthearted about it. She was almost jovial, or at least as jovial as he figured Michonne ever got.

"I told you to stop apologizing. It's normal really. I had a good time." Michonne had been going through in her mind trying to come up with all the things that someone could say to make a man feel better after sex. Apparently she was going to need to use them all on Daryl.

"You did not have a good time." Daryl said in a pouty tone.

Michonne laughed. "Ok, Daryl, you're right. I didn't have a good time. It doesn't matter though. You'll make it up to me next time." She said, getting to her feet and walking unashamedly across the store.

"You mean there's gonna be a next time?" Daryl called out to her. She reappeared opening a box of baby wipes. She took some out and handed the box to Daryl.

"Here, clean up. We don't want to get back to the prison smelling like sex." She said.

"You mean there's gonna be a next time?" Daryl repeated, taking the box and watching her wiping herself down.

"I assumed there would be a next time. I hope that's not all I'm getting out of this." Michonne said, not looking at him. Daryl smiled. Before his eyes she was transforming again, back into the Michonne he'd known before.

"You know, I like sexy Michonne." He said. "She's a lot softer, and I think she likes me more."

Michonne started to get dressed without saying anything, but Daryl did notice that she smiled. He followed suit and got dressed as well. They didn't say anything else to one another while they were in the store. They loaded up the bags in silence and started back toward the prison.

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"Well, we ain't gettin' back smellin' like sex, but we are gettin' back smellin' fresher than Lil' Asskicker." Daryl said when they were driving.

It was true. The smell was a bit much in contrast to the other scents around them. Michonne didn't respond, though. She was actually thinking about the fact that she was sore and was glad that the wound on her thigh would keep anyone from wondering why she was moving a little stiffly.

"We tellin' anybody about this?" Daryl asked. He wasn't sure what was going on with Michonne right now. He hoped she wasn't regretting what they had just done.

"Do you want to tell anyone about it?" She asked.

"Not really." Daryl had to admit that this hadn't exactly been his moment of glory and he'd be quite happy without sharing it with everyone at the prison.

"Well then." Michonne said.

"What about us?" Daryl asked.

"What about us?" Michonne asked back.

"Well, is there an us?" Daryl asked.

"Do you want there to be?" Michonne was looking out the window and Daryl couldn't see her face, but he thought he heard a little hopefulness in her voice.

"I kinda like the idea of an us." Daryl said. He held his breath, waiting to see how she would respond.

"Then I guess there's an us." She said. Daryl was relieved. He reached over and took her hand. She intertwined her fingers with his.

"'Chonne...are we gonna tell 'em 'bout us?" Daryl asked.

"Let 'em figure it out for themselves. I don't think we need to make an announcement." Michonne said. She hadn't missed the fact that Daryl had taken her hand this time. He hadn't needed the prompting that he needed before. If Daryl was feeling bolder, it wouldn't take them long at the prison to figure out that they were giving this a try. No one would really care anyway, except maybe Carol. Michonne was a little concerned about how Carol was going to take it. For now, she was just savoring the moment. This felt _easy_, and that was a feeling that she hadn't had in a long time.


	11. Chapter 11

AN: I'm a little bit ashamed of the fact that I've spent all day in my pajamas, just writing this story, but I love writing it. The characters are surprising me and I can't even wait to see what's next. I feel like they're turning into this epic awkward couple…like it's so wrong, but it's so right. Anyway, I hope you enjoy! I'm happy to see the reviews, at least I know I'm not writing in vain. Thanks, everyone.

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Daryl still hadn't really figured out how the "us" thing worked. He had never been an "us" before. He'd always been more of a loner. His family had taught him early in life that people were good at letting you down. People were good at not being what they said they would be. He'd always just felt like attachments weren't worth it in the end. But Michonne didn't feel that way. It didn't feel like she was going to let him down.

Still, this whole "us" thing was a little confusing. He wasn't really sure how it worked. They had been an "us" now for two weeks and nothing had changed except that Michonne spoke a little more freely around him. He didn't think anyone at the prison even knew about them. There hadn't been anything to let them know. Neither of them had touched each other except on watch, and even then there'd only been a little making out. He wasn't sure they were doing it right. It seemed a lot different than Maggie and Glenn, and a whole lot different than Rick and Rachel.

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Maggie and Glenn pulled into the gate in the delivery van that they had stolen for their runs. Rick closed the gate behind them and walked behind the vehicle up to the prison. Daryl popped the last of the crackers he was eating into his mouth and dusted his hands off on his pants.

"Delivery's here." He yelled into the prison. Everyone shuffled out slowly, except Hershel and Sasha and Tyreese who were on watch and had alerted Rick of the approaching vehicle. When Maggie and Glenn hit the town for a run, they usually hit it hard. They were going from store to store now every few days, trying to get the last of everything that they might need or want. Soon that town would be picked over, and they'd have to find another farther out for supplies. It wasn't an ideal situation, but it was the best that they could do for the time being. The size of their deliveries, however, meant that unloading and sorting things was an "all hands on deck" experience.

As they started getting boxes and bags out, passing them down the line that they formed as though they had all become a human conveyor belt, Glenn was reporting to Rick on the run.

"We got most everything today." Glenn said. "I think there might be enough for one more run, but we need to make it soon. I think there's another group in the area."

"Do you think it's some of the good citizens of Woodbury?" Rick asked.

"Could be, it's hard to tell. Whoever it is it looked like they might have stayed at the pharmacy. Someone had made a bed there since the last time we were there." Glenn said.

Michonne shot Daryl a look. He honestly had zero idea what the look meant, but he definitely saw it. He wasn't sure what he was supposed to do about it, but the look definitely was meant to give him some sort instruction.

"Daryl and Michonne were the last to do a pharmacy run. Did y'all see anything suspicious?" Rick asked.

Daryl looked at Michonne. Her expression was of absolutely no help to him whatsoever.

"Suspicious? No, man, we didn't see anything. There was only one Walker. The place was deserted." Daryl said. He passed the box to his left and looked at Michonne again. Man, he had to have a talk with her about her facial expression communication skills.

"Was the bed there when y'all were there?" Rick asked. Rick was always worried about other groups these days. No one at the prison was delusional enough to think they were the only ones out there anymore. The fiasco with Woodbury and their own acceptance of a few more into their numbers had taught them that they had no idea how many survivors there were in the world, or what they were capable of. Daryl wanted to tell him not to worry about it, but if he told them that they had put the "bed" there, it wouldn't take them long to figure out what they'd done on that run and Michonne might not find that the best way to introduce the "us" to the group. There was no way around Rick freaking out. If Daryl told him the bed was there when they got there, he was going to react. If Daryl told them it wasn't, he was going to react. The only way to avoid wasting energy on extra watches and tightened security against some imaginary group roaming around the area was to admit that they'd been responsible.

"Rick, can I talk to you a minute?" Daryl asked. Rick looked confused.

"Sure, Daryl." He said.

"Uh, over there…alone." Daryl said. He passed down a bag that he had in his hands, waited for Rick to get rid of the box he was holding and then the two went walking through the courtyard together.

"What's going on, Daryl?" Rick asked when they were out of earshot of the group.

"Listen, there ain't nobody been in that town but us." Daryl said. Rick looked confused. "It was me that put that pallet there in the pharmacy."

"What do you mean?" Rick asked. For a fleeting moment he started to get mad, concerned that Daryl would take something like a supplies run lightly enough to take a nap, but that wasn't Daryl. Then it dawned on him. Daryl had not been alone on the run, and he had insisted on taking Michonne, even though she would have been the least helpful person besides Hershel or Judith.

The look on Rick's face told Daryl he understood. Rick smiled at him.

"Michonne?" Rick asked. He glanced back at the group.

"Man, don't look over there." Daryl said. "And don't say nothin' neither."

"Oh, it's a secret?"

"Naw, it ain't no secret, it's just I don't want people talkin' 'bout her. It ain't like that. I mean it wasn't supposed to be somethin' like that. We just wanted, you know, to be alone and you can't get alone here very much." Daryl said. The way Rick was grinning was making him uncomfortable.

"So are you two supposed to be some kind of item?" Rick asked. It seemed highly unlikely to him. He'd always thought that maybe Daryl and Carol would eventually seal the deal, but he'd never imagined Michonne to ever be with any man.

"Yeah, we're givin' it a go." Daryl said. Rick patted him roughly on the shoulder.

"Well, OK then. Have you told Carol?" Rick asked.

"What am I gonna tell her? Sorry you thought I was with you, but I'm not with you 'cause I'm with 'Chonne?" Daryl was tired of everyone always bugging him about Carol. Sometimes he thought that was why Michonne never touched him or kissed him.

"I don't know what you need to tell her, but you need to tell her something before she finds your clothes in Michonne's cell." Rick said. He smiled again, shaking his head and started back toward the group.

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"So, it sounds like we might have another wedding to plan before long." Rachel said to Maggie while they were sitting at the table sorting personal supplies into boxes. Everyone got a box, and everyone got the same rations of things. The only difference made between any of the boxes was that the women also got feminine hygiene products. It was mindless work, but it had to be done.

"Don't tell me Rick asked you!" Maggie said.

Carol was listening to the two of them, not really joining in. She liked to listen to them gossip, but she hardly got involved. The table gossip while they were working made things more normal. It brought back that lighthearted world that they had all enjoyed once, before Walkers became a common threat. They talked about wedding plans for weddings that would never actually happen that way. The reality was that when Glenn and Maggie were married, there would be no dresses and no flowers, but she deserved the chance to imagine how it would have been, in the world they had known before. Now apparently Rachel would get to plan her dream wedding that would never take place.

"No, he didn't…at least not yet, but he did tell me some pretty interesting news." Rachel said. "Apparently there's more than meets the eye around here."

Maggie looked so excited that Carol had to smile at her. She couldn't imagine what Rachel was talking about. Most everyone around here that was likely to find someone had already settled in. Maybe Tyreese had his sights set on Michonne? If he did, she imagined that would be quite the job for him, but it could at least provide them with something more to talk about.

"Apparently Daryl told him that he and Michonne are a couple. I think it would be safe to say that we need to put a little WD40 on Michonne's cot." Rachel said.

Carol froze. Daryl and Michonne? That couldn't happen. That _wouldn't _happen. Daryl had always kind of shucked any of her advances, under the pretense that he didn't believe in relationships, especially not in the world that they lived in now. Carol sat down at the table.

"I'm sure Rick just heard him wrong." She said.

"No, I don't think so. Rick said that Daryl told them they were sleeping together and that they were pretty official." Rachel said. Maggie looked at Carol.

Maggie knew that Carol loved Daryl. He had been the one that had gotten her through losing Sophia. He had been so cute about things, bringing her flowers, offering her a shoulder to cry on whenever she needed it. Maggie had been fairly certain that if Daryl ever decided to give love a chance, Carol would have been the first that he had chosen. Daryl and Michonne seemed an unlikely couple. Maggie didn't know Michonne well. No one knew Michonne well, but she couldn't imagine her finding anything of interest in a guy like Daryl. They liked to go on runs together, and they liked to fight Walkers together, but that was because they were typically the two strongest of the group. It couldn't be because they were _interested_ in each other.

"I agree with Carol." Maggie said. "Rick probably heard him wrong or is reading into things."

"Well you remember that bed that you and Glenn found in the pharmacy? Apparently they were the ones who made it." Rachel said. She didn't really know Carol that well, but she couldn't figure out why Maggie would doubt the validity of anything that Rick said.

Carol got up from the table.

"I'm…I'm gonna go get some more water. We need to do clothes soon." She said, taking one of the buckets and heading out to the courtyard. There was a small river nearby where they often went to get water, and the walk would do her good. Normally none of them went without someone to back them up, but Carol didn't want company.

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Daryl saw Carol going through the courtyard; bucket in hand, and alone. Normally they went in bunches to get water. It didn't look like anyone was going with her, and from what he could see, she didn't even look armed.

Daryl jogged after Carol and caught up with her just as she was reaching the gate.

"Carol! Carol! What are you doin'?" He called out.

Carol turned around and looked at him. Her face was wet with tears. Daryl didn't understand what was going on, but she was clearly upset. She was also clearly unarmed. He followed her, even though she hadn't responded to his question.

"Is it true?" She asked as they neared the river. Daryl had been silently following Carol along, picking off at least a half a dozen Walkers that she wouldn't have been able to kill.

"What? Is what true?" Daryl asked.

"You and Michonne?" Carol asked. She stopped walking and turned to face Daryl. The look on his face was partially one of confusion and partially one of understanding. She read it clearly. He knew exactly what she was talking about, but he didn't know how she'd known about it.

"What do you mean?" Daryl asked.

"You could have at least told me." Carol said.

"Told you what? I didn't think I had to tell you nothin'!" Daryl said.

"So you're with Michonne now?" Carol asked.

"Yes…I mean, I guess I am. We decided we'd be together." Daryl said. A Walker approached and he stabbed it with an arrow. "I really don't feel like dealin' with you right now, you nasty asshole." He said.

"When were you going to tell me?" Carol asked.

"Tell you what? Carol, I didn't know I had to tell you everything I was doin'!" Daryl said.

"You always said you didn't believe in relationships. You said you didn't believe in them before, so you surely didn't believe in them now." Carol countered, nearly slipping on some loose leaves. Daryl caught her by the back of the arm and heaved her back to her feet.

"I didn't believe in relationships…" Daryl said. "I still don't know what I believe in. I don't even understand what's going on between me and 'Chonne and I sure as hell don't know what's going on with you right now."

"Don't you get it? I loved you!" Carol said. Daryl stopped for a minute. Two more Walkers were sauntering their way and he ran at them. "Sonsabitches! Can't nobody get no damn peace no more!" He yelled at them as they crumpled to the ground.

"What the hell you mean?" He yelled at Carol's back. She was continuing on as though the Walkers that had approached were invisible. "You loved me? Who the hell asked you to go and do a thing like that?" He asked.

"Nobody asks you to love, Daryl, it just happens that way. Anyway, I'm sorry that I wasted my time on you." Carol said.

Daryl didn't know what to think. She was obviously angry, any fool could see that. No one walked as stupidly through the woods as she'd been doing unless they were absolutely furious or downright insane. They reached the river and Carol filled her bucket, turning to angrily head back to the prison. Daryl stopped her, putting a hand on each of her shoulders.

"Listen, Carol, I don't really know what's going on here. I care about you. I always have. You're like family to me. I never had a sister, but if I had one I would have wanted her to be like you. It's just different between 'Chonne and me…it don't mean that I don't care about you." He said. Carol shook him off.

"I never wanted to be your sister, Daryl. I wasn't looking for a brother." Carol said angrily. She trekked back to the prison and Daryl followed behind her, trying to make sure that no Walkers got her, but positive that he'd never understand women.


	12. Chapter 12

Michonne didn't know all about the proceedings from a few days before. She was pretty sure that Daryl had said something to Rick when they'd gone off together. Otherwise it would have been completely out of context for Rick to tell Glenn that the pallet in the pharmacy was nothing to worry about.

As she dressed and rambled through the prison, Michonne felt _different_. She felt like everyone was looking at her, and it wasn't a look that she was entirely comfortable with. She slipped into the kitchen and was surprised when the plate that held her breakfast fell inexplicably in her lap.

"Oh, I'm so sorry." Carol said. "I stumbled…here, I'll get you another plate."

Her tone wasn't entirely sincere and Michonne wondered what was going on. It was clear now, everyone was looking at her, and it was the fact that she had oatmeal dripping off her legs that got their attention.

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"What did you tell Rick?" Michonne asked. After the most uncomfortable breakfast ever she had found Daryl in the watch tower.

"I just told him it was us that had made that bed in the pharmacy. He said he wouldn't tell no one, but I guess he told someone because Carol is ready to crucify me." Daryl said. He leaned back against the wall. "I told her weren't nothin' goin' on between us, but I guess she'd don made up her mind that there was."

"I know that much! I got a lap full of oatmeal and canned ham that told me that!" Michonne said, taking her seat.

Daryl was sorry for that. Carol being mad at him was one thing, but taking it out on Michonne was another.

"I'm sorry, 'Chonne." He offered. He hadn't meant to ever make this big of a mess of things. He'd seriously never considered the fact that Carol felt the way about him that she'd obviously felt. She seemed to see this like her relationship with him crumble, but he'd never seen their relationship being one that even had the possibility of crumbling. She was like a sister to him. He didn't want to have to tell her when he was sleeping with someone. That was embarrassing, and it wasn't like he'd had sex with Michonne since the pharmacy.

Daryl's face was so very sad. Michonne couldn't be mad at him. He looked like a lost puppy right now. She wanted to be mad, but she just couldn't.

"Hey, it's OK, it's not your fault." She offered.

Michonne still hadn't asked him for that "next time". Daryl thought. Maybe he'd screwed up all around. There was supposed to be an "us", but he didn't feel like he thought an "us" should feel. He'd thought something would happen. He'd thought she would move to his perch or he'd move to her cell. He was really open to whatever made her happy. He'd thought that she would kiss him, even when people were looking, and that he wouldn't have to work so hard to understand what was happening around him. None of that had happened. Since the pharmacy, all he could say for sure that happened was that Carol was mad at him and Michonne had suffered a lap full of breakfast.

"'Chonne, what are we doing?" He asked.

"What do you mean? We're on watch." Michonne said.

"I mean what are we doing?" He asked. There was a fire in Daryl that Michonne hadn't seen before. She knew what he was doing. He was ready for some kind of "next step."

"We're being us, Daryl. We're being us." She said.

"I want another chance." Daryl said. "I know you didn't have a good time at the pharmacy, but I want another chance before it's too late for me not to expect a different outcome."

"What do you want to do? If we're in my cell everyone will know." Michonne said.

"And if you come to the perch everyone will know." Daryl countered. "Does it really matter, 'Chonne? Does it matter if they know? They know now and it ain't doin' us a world 'a good." Daryl said.

Michonne had never seen Daryl look desperate. She had very seldom seen anyone look desperate, but the look on his face right now couldn't be explained in any other way. She had to admit to herself that she'd been holding back. She'd been thinking that any amount of affection would get people stirred up in such a small environment, but they were stirred now as it was. She would like another shot at what had happened at the pharmacy. She'd like to see what Daryl was like when he wasn't in the same unexpected position that he'd been in there.

"I guess it doesn't matter if they know." Michonne said. She got up and went over to where Daryl was sitting, squatting down as best she could to be near him. She kissed him and he returned the kiss, this time tangling his fingers in her hair and pulling her toward him. When the kiss broke, Michonne was sure that he was somehow different. He'd shaken off his shackles from Carol and from the expectations of the group, which influenced him greatly. He'd gained confidence with her and knew that he wanted something, and that he didn't need her to tell him what she wanted. Daryl was ready, at least to some degree, to be a lover. She just hoped now that she could live up to his expectations.

"So do I come to you, or do you come to me?" Daryl asked. He wasn't even looking at her. He was pretending that he was watching something below when Michonne knew there was nothing going on.

"You come to me." She said. Smiling at him. _He still can't look at me._ She thought. Maybe he wasn't as ready and as confident as she thought to continue on to the next level, but it was a risk she was willing to take.

Daryl grunted his understanding and pretended that the four Walkers circling the most secure part of the fence were a plausible threat. He didn't want to look at Michonne for fear of blushing or otherwise embarrassing himself, but the thought of going to her cell tonight was more than a little exciting. He hoped this time he wouldn't have to spend all of his time afterwards apologizing.


	13. Chapter 13

Daryl kept his hand pressed firmly over Michonne's mouth, and she bit at his fingers occasionally. If they had had any hope of keeping this night's encounter a secret, she had certainly ruined that. Daryl didn't realize that the quietest woman he'd ever met was able to transform into the loudest person he'd ever met just by having an orgasm.

Even after he settled beside her, both of them panting furiously, he kept his hand firmly pressed against her mouth. She mumbled something. He lifted his hand.

"Can't breathe." She whispered, gasping for a little extra air.

"Sorry." Daryl whispered. "You didn't tell me you were a screamer…you also didn't tell me you were a biter."

"You didn't tell me you were actually good at this." Michonne said, curling herself up against him and pulling his arm around her like she was covering herself with a blanket. "If I'd have known that I would have waited out another round or two at the pharmacy." She added.

Daryl kissed her shoulder. He didn't say anything, but she felt him smile. He had surprised her, and she knew that he was silently congratulating himself right now.

Daryl wasn't sure what the protocol for this kind of event was. Was he supposed to go back to his perch, or was he free to spend the night here? Michonne's body felt so warm against his, in contrast to the cool prison air, and he didn't want to go. He hesitated a few more minutes. Finally, her rhythmic breathing told him that she had gone to sleep, there with his arm around her. He sighed and put his own head down, thankful that he wasn't going anywhere.

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"Everybody! Everybody! Walkers! Now!" Rick's yelling echoed through the prison. Daryl woke up, slightly, still groggy from sleep.

"Man, what the fuck you yellin' about?" He called out, still not fully awake.

"Walkers! Walkers! We need everybody!" Rick yelled again. Daryl jumped then, realizing in his foggy haze what was going on.

"It's too damn early in the morning." Daryl said to no one as he crawled over Michonne, shaking her awake. That was the thing about Walkers, they had no respect for normal schedules.

Everyone scrambled around, dressing and arming themselves, oblivious to Rick's frantic behavior. Daryl was one of the first to join Rick near the doors. When he opened them, slightly, he took out the first two Walkers that were trying to get in the crack. Then, noticing his comrades behind him, he pushed the doors fully open.

What Daryl found when he opened the door was not at all what he expected. What he expected was the traditional twenty or so Walkers that normally came through with a herd, pushing through some weak entry point in the patched up fence. What he actually saw was the largest herd that he had seen since they'd been on the farm.

Daryl pulled the door shut quickly and turned around.

"We're fucked." He said to everyone gathering there. He looked around at the group. Everyone would be fighting today except Hershel and Judith. _They needed everyone._ Daryl looked at them all, some of them still sleepy looking. The five newest members to the group had come from Woodbury, and Daryl realized he didn't even know their names. They were all going out there together into what Daryl could only describe as a sea of Walkers. Daryl's stomach sunk a little. _Some of them weren't going to make it. Some of these faces would never be staring back at him again. _

"We've got no choice." Rick said. There were easily 100 Walkers in the courtyard. He knew that it didn't look good, but they had no choice. Sasha and Tyreese were already out there, already fighting. What were they going to do? Cower in the prison?

Daryl sighed. He cast a quick glance at Michonne, saying a silent prayer that neither of them would get overrun. He'd have traded the whole rest of the group for that not to happen…he felt guilty thinking it, but it was true. _He'd have sacrificed them all if it had guaranteed they'd make it through._ He had never been as happy as he was moments before Rick had woken them up and it wasn't fair to think that he may never be that happy again.

Daryl put his crossbow on his back and took out his knife. It was going to be hand to hand combat until they thinned the herd a little.

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Outside was chaos. It was impossible to see where anyone was. It was impossible to focus on anything other than the hoards of Walkers rushing toward each of them. Michonne had never seen so many Walkers together. She was almost dizzy from trying to keep turning in all directions, trying to keep every side covered at the same time.

Daryl was fighting side by side with one of the new guys. He had decided that if they made it out alive, he was going to find out what that guy's name was. The new guy was pretty good with a knife.

Rick felt like he could hardly keep up with the Walkers. They just kept coming. He wanted to know if they were making progress, how many were left, but he couldn't take his focus off his immediate surroundings to find out.

After what seemed like an eternity, Glenn stabbed a Walker and didn't have another coming toward him. He froze for a minute, turning in all directions. Even though he'd been fighting the whole time, he felt like this was the first time he'd seen the courtyard today. It was like everything was coming into focus now. Everybody was spread out, each fighting in their own area. A dozen Walkers were about all that was left. _Well, ten…_He thought as he watched Michonne take two down suddenly.

Daryl was out of breath, but all the Walkers were down. What was even more exciting was that he could see Michonne wandering around the other side of the courtyard, stabbing some of them that apparently hadn't been fully dead. They had made it. From the looks of it, everyone had made it, although the piles of Walkers everywhere would have easily concealed anyone that had been taken down.

Michonne saw Glenn trotting off to check the status of the fence. She found Daryl and, without saying anything, quickly kissed him.

The kiss wasn't really a kiss as much as it was a peck, but Daryl knew what it meant. It was also the first time that she had kissed him in front of anyone else, but he doubted that anyone out there had noticed it. Everyone was too busy surveying the damage and trying to figure out how they were going to burn this hoard.

"We're down two." Tyreese said as everyone started gathering near the doors for further instructions. "Susan and Mike."

_Susan and Mike_…two of the nameless people to Daryl. He hadn't known their names, but it was still a little sad to know that Susan and Mike were gone. From the look on Sasha's face, Susan and Mike must have been good people. Daryl was a little sorry that he hadn't gotten to know them.

"I'll help you bury them." He offered to Tyreese. Tyreese looked relieved and thanked him.

"That's fine, you two bury them. I'm going to help Glenn with the fence. Everyone else, get started burning the Walkers." Rick barked. Everyone silently went to their jobs.

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Rick had called a table meeting. That meant no women and no children. The only exception was Carol, who didn't have any opinions anyway or didn't voice them. She semi-attended table meetings by serving coffee to the men.

Carol was fully aware that Rick only let her into his super private "club" because he thought she didn't have an opinion on anything. The truth was that she had plenty of opinions, but she knew that Rick wouldn't listen to them, so why should she bother voicing them? Besides, what Rick wasn't aware of was the fact that she worked at these meetings like a spy. She'd serve them all like some kind of hostess if that's what it took to keep the women really informed about what happened instead of just accepting whatever watered down version of the truth Rick decided to fabricate for them because of "their sensitive natures".

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"I just thought the fuckers were hibernating." Daryl said.

"No, this wasn't an accident." Rick said. When they had gone to repair the fence, what they had found was surprising. In the distance there were six semi trucks with their trailers open. One entire section of the fence had been cut out. "He's been storing up Walkers to release on us. He turned them loose because he thought they would overpower us."

"They almost did." Tyreese offered. "Look, he's a sick man. He stored up Walkers before, but I would have never thought he would have managed to gather a herd that big.

"That's why we ain't seen hardly none in weeks. I bet he was the one that cleaned that town out. No damn wonder there weren't no Walkers there, the Governor rounded 'em up."

"So what do we do?" Glenn asked. "Do you think he'll be back?"

"Oh, he'll be back. No doubt about it. He'll be back and there's no telling what he'll have up his sleeve." Rick sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. He was getting a headache and after the day's events he wasn't really in the mood for the fight he was about to have with the group. "There's only one thing we can do…"

"Shoot him in the fuckin' head?" Daryl said.

"We could, but we can't get close enough to him. He's got the advantage on us. We're like sitting ducks here and we don't even know where he is anymore." Rick said. No one was in the best of moods tonight, that much was clear. "He can pick us off one by one, and he knows it. He's going to keep hitting us until there's no one left."

"So we find him and we kill him." Daryl said.

"The next time he sends one of his toadies waving the white flag and wanting to negotiate, we have to give him Michonne." Rick said.

"Like hell we are!" Daryl said, slamming his hand angrily on the table. Carol jumped at the sound and found herself backing up into a corner.

"Daryl, I know you've got some little thing going for her right now, but you've got to think about the good of the group. You really want all of us to risk our lives everyday just for Michonne? Are you really prepared to see all of us die like those two people today when we could solve this?"

"If I'm not wrong, Michonne was out there fightin' today just as much as you were." Daryl said. "Michonne's done just as much as anyone else in this group. What makes you think the Governor would leave us alone anyway? He's been so straightforward and trustworthy."

"It's a risk, but it might be our only shot." Rick said.

Everyone at the table was glancing nervously between the two men. They had been good friends through most of this, but it looked like something was breaking down now. It was clear that Rick thought he had the best idea, and it was also clear that Daryl wasn't going to agree.

"Fuck that, man! Rick, the Governor killed over half his "army". You saw what he did to Andrea. We've got some of his town here and a whole bunch of others ran off to try to make it on their own. He's probably only got eight men left, seven maybe 'cause I killed that asshole in the woods. Have you become such a pansy that you're going to bow down to eight men?"

"They were eight men with over a hundred Walkers that attacked us at dawn." Rick said.

"And we killed over a hundred Walkers." Daryl countered.

"We lost two people." Rick said.

"We lose people all the time, that's what happens in this world now. People get eaten by Walkers. Hell, that's just natural, but do you realize what he would do to Michonne? That's _not_ natural and I'm not going to let it happen. When he sends another one of his guys with the white flag asking if we want to give up, do you know what we're going to do?"

Rick just looked at Daryl, but his look showed that he wanted Daryl to continue.

"We're going to shoot him in the fuckin' face." Daryl said. "I'm tired of this bullshit with the Governor. Until he's dead none of us are safe. Even if you handed over Michonne. None of us are safe!"

In Daryl's opinion the topic was closed. No one in the room said anything or even moved. Daryl stood up and walked out of the room.


	14. Chapter 14

Daryl woke up when an elbow jabbed into his chest.

"Shit." He said.

"Sorry." Michonne whispered. Daryl sighed.

"Can't you get still?" He asked. She'd been tossing and turning for three nights and it was driving Daryl crazy. He'd considered going back to his perch when it was time to go to sleep, but it was too cold, and he didn't really want to leave her, he just wanted her to be still.

"No, I can't." Michonne said. She shivered and Daryl pulled her in closer to him and sacrificed part a blanket that was on top of him.

Michonne was miserable. It was cold. It was bone cold. That's what her grandmother had called this kind of cold. _Bone cold_…so cold it settled all the way down into your bones. That's why they hadn't seen or heard from the Governor in so long. Even a person as crazy as he was wasn't going to come out into the cold just to continue fighting over some stupid grudge.

It was too cold to sleep. Michonne hated being cold more than anything. She didn't care if it was 100 degrees outside, but she had no tolerance for this. She lie there, remembering that she used to have an electric blanket. She had loved that thing. When she had gotten a divorce from her husband she used to tell the women at the office that she didn't need him. As long as she had that electric blanket she was warm at night…and the blanket was never an asshole.

_She used to think that all men were assholes._ Not Daryl, he was different. Daryl made her feel special. She felt like she was important to him. It was never anything big, but it wasn't really the big things that mattered in this world anymore. It was things like the fact that he knew she liked fruit cocktail, so every time they had it he would save his portion till last and then slide the bowl across the table to her. He never said anything; he'd just kind of half smile at her and slide the bowl across the table. Michonne kissed his fingers and he stirred a little.

"Not again, 'Chonne." He mumbled. Michonne felt a little bad for him. The only time she wasn't cold was when they were having sex. She knew he didn't mind, but lately she'd been treating him like an amusement park ride. "I'm already dehydrated…try to sleep a little."

"Daryl…" Michonne whispered. Daryl moaned.

"I told you, 'Chonne, three times is my limit without sleep." He said.

"No, it's not that." She said.

"What is it?" He asked.

"Did you ever have an electric blanket?" She asked.

"What?" Daryl wasn't sure he was awake right now. He was completely exhausted and wanted to sleep desperately, and Michonne was chatting with him? _It was the middle of the night and she was chatting?_

"Did you ever have an electric blanket?" She repeated.

Yep. She wanted to chat. When Daryl _wanted_ her to talk he could barely get four words out of her. Now that he wanted her to be quiet, she was going to start chatting. Daryl always thought he didn't understand women, but he knew he didn't understand Michonne.

"No, 'Chonne. I never had an electric blanket." He groaned.

"I did. I loved it. I wish I had an electric blanket. I wish we had electricity." She said. Daryl moaned. He'd give anything for her just to go to sleep right now.

"I don't need one." He said. "I've got you." He pulled her tighter to him, trying to transfer as much heat to her possible and reached over and flicked another piece of blanket on top of her. He might freeze to death this winter, but he'd at least like to do it on more than an hour of sleep a night.

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When Daryl woke up Michonne was already gone. He got dressed quickly and headed to the kitchen. Most everyone was in there. As he came in the door, everyone was staring at him awkwardly.

"What? What's your problem?" He asked, sitting down and rubbing his eyes. Carol quietly put a bowl of oatmeal and a cup of coffee in front of him, but no one said anything.

Finally, Glenn started clapping and everyone else burst out laughing and followed suit, clapping. Daryl was so confused.

"What the hell? Has everyone around here lost their minds?" He asked. He knew cabin fever could do that to people and they did spend a lot of time shut in together. First Michonne wanted to talk all night and now these dumbasses were applauding him for eating breakfast.

"We've just been having an interesting little conversation." Maggie said, giggling.

"'Bout what?" Daryl asked.

"Well, we've decided to vote you and Michonne noisiest couple in the prison." Maggie said.

"I've heard Michonne say more at night in the last three nights than I've heard her say during the day in the last three months." Rachel added.

"Shit…" Daryl said. "Can't get no damn privacy. What are y'all listenin' to us for anyway?"

"It's hard not to hear everything that happens in this place." Hershel said. "Don't worry, son, you're just being vibrant… healthy people."

"So is she still trying to sleep off your little love fest?" Rachel asked.

Daryl was confused.

"No, I thought she would be in here." Daryl said. He looked at Carol who shrugged and shook her head.

"No, I haven't seen her all morning." Carol said.

"Did she have watch?" Daryl asked.

As if on cue, Michonne came through the door, and leaning her katana in the corner, sat down at the table. Carol gave her some breakfast and she thanked her. Carol was starting to forgive her and Daryl and Michonne was relieved. When you were around someone as much as all of them were together, it wasn't good to have disputes. She thought that in the beginning Carol thought it was going to be some kind of temporary thing between them, but as the months had gone on, she had settled more into the idea that this was something that worked for them. As odd as it may be, they just _worked_.

Michonne stared remorsefully at the oatmeal. She didn't want to eat this. She didn't really want to eat anything. She wasn't feeling great. She knew she needed to eat, though, or it would be a while before lunch. She picked up her spoon and brought it part way to her mouth. Suddenly she wasn't cold anymore; she was very, very hot. She put the spoonful of oatmeal in her mouth, but just as soon as she did, she realized she was about to hurl. She put her hands over her mouth and ran out the kitchen door, nearly knocking Glenn over in the process.

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Carol found Michonne outside, on her hands and knees, still retching. Carol went over and sat beside her, putting a bottle of water next to her.

"I know my oatmeal isn't that great, but I didn't think it deserved such harsh criticism." Carol said. Michonne glanced at her for a second and then promptly returned to heaving. Carol reached over and rubbed her back. "Take some deep breaths, it'll pass."

Finally the wave of nausea did pass and Michonne sat down. She accepted the bottle of water from Carol and washed her mouth out, spitting the water out and wiping her mouth with the back of her hand.

Carol was just looking at her. Michonne didn't know what to do. Why was Carol just staring at her like that? She had just a hint of a smile on her face. Michonne just stared back.

Carol realized that this could be a long process if she didn't say anything. A staring contest with Michonne could go on for hours and it was too cold out here for that.

"I know it's a long shot that you would, but do you want to talk about it?" Carol asked.

"Talk about what?" Michonne asked. She sipped at the water and the action immediately caused her to start retching again.

"It was too soon to try to drink the water." Carol said. "I brought it to you for washing the taste out of your mouth, not for drinking yet. Try to take some deep breaths. It'll pass."

The retching did pass and Michonne sat again, panting.

"Point taken." Carol said. "The baby doesn't like oatmeal."

Michonne looked at Carol as though she had just sprouted another head. She went to absent mindedly take a drink of water and Carol reached over and took the bottle out of her hand.

"Not yet. You'll just start it up again. For now, just breathe." Carol said. Michonne wrinkled her forehead in response and Carol stifled a laugh. "I had terrible morning sickness with Sophia."

Michonne was trying to process everything. Was Carol insinuating that she was pregnant? Was she pregnant? Michonne tried to remember back to when she'd been pregnant with her girls. Some women said they just knew when they were pregnant, but that hadn't been the case for Michonne. She also didn't remember ever getting sick. She found out because she quit having her period, but that was something she hadn't paid attention to in a long time. When it happened she took care of it and the rest of the time she didn't think about it.

Carol could see that Michonne really hadn't thought about this before. "Not to pry," she said "but I do all of the laundry here…I kinda have a good idea of everyone's _schedule_. It's also been a while since you came by the supply room for any tampons."

"But…" Michonne started. She stopped. She didn't know what she was going to say next. She didn't know if she was pregnant or not. She didn't know how she felt about it. How was she supposed to feel about being pregnant right now? Suddenly she felt sick again.

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Everybody was more than happy about it when Michonne told them she was going to lie down because of this stomach flu or whatever she had. While she was gone they had decided that it couldn't be food poisoning since they all ate the same thing. It now had them all panicking that she was going to spread it to the rest of them. Ironically, since all this shit had happened and they'd discovered that they were infected with pretty much the most disgusting virus ever, no one really ever got sick. There just didn't seem to be as many germs around. Now that Michonne was sick, they were beginning to worry about a winter of passing it back and forth to each other.

Carol was the only one that wasn't worried about it. When she came back in, Daryl asked her about it, unsure if he should go with Michonne or go help Rick with one of his projects. She had patted him on the arm and assured him that Michonne was fine and really just wanted to be left alone, so reluctantly he had followed Rick.

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Michonne spent most of the day lying on the bed, staring at nothing. The nausea kept rolling over her, but she hadn't really been sick. Carol had brought her a trash can and put it by the bed just in case.

She couldn't believe she might be pregnant. It just didn't seem right. That's not what this world was about anymore. It wasn't about creating life, it was about death. Everything was death and decay. Sure, they had Judith, and look what happened to her mother. Things had not worked out very great in that situation. And what about the Walkers? Could she even swing a katana when she was huge? She'd be pretty much totally defenseless…and since this had broken out, that wasn't a way that she liked feeling. And then there was Daryl. They were still fairly new at this whole relationship thing. How would he react if she told him she was pregnant? How would anyone react for that matter?

Michonne didn't know what time of day it was when Carol came into her cell and sat down on the bed. She was carrying a mug with a spoon in it.

"I brought you some soup." Carol said. "Chicken noodle, and I crumbled some crackers into it to soften them up. I made yours just a little saltier than everyone else's. The salt will help keep your stomach settled."

Michonne sat up and thanked Carol, taking the soup. When she took the first swallow, Michonne thought she had never tasted anything more delicious in her life. She didn't realize how hungry she was and the soup was like some kind of nectar from heaven. It was warm and salty and soothing.

"Take it easy." Carol said. "Don't get too excited or you could make yourself sick again." Michonne held the mug in her hands for a minute before taking another swallow.

"Why are you being so nice to me?" Michonne asked after a few minutes. The feeling that she was getting from Carol right now was unlike any that she had felt from Carol in all the time that she knew her.

"You're not a bad person, Michonne, and Daryl loves you…and I care about Daryl." Carol said. She paused for a minute. "And I like taking care of people…and I like babies."

"I don't even know…" Michonne started. Carol reached in her pocket.

"I thought you might say that." She said, handing Michonne a pregnancy test. "Glenn and Maggie picked up a bunch of those just in case. Do it first thing in the morning. It's more accurate that way."

Michonne thanked Carol and they both sat in silence while Michonne finished her soup. Carol took the mug, instructed Michonne to rest, and then started out of the cell. She stopped just before she exited it and turned around.

"Also, Michonne, I had a daughter once. I've been there before." Carol said. The look on her face was far off and a little sad. Michonne felt sorry for her for a moment. She knew that look.

"Me too." She said. Carol looked at her for a moment, but didn't say anything. She simply turned and left the cell.


	15. Chapter 15

Carol had never really thought of Michonne as someone you could read very easily. In fact up until now Carol had only seen Michonne wear one or two expressions. That was until now. Now she was wearing an expression that Carol had actually never seen her wear. The Michonne that sat down at the table in front of her looked absolutely terrified.

"Do you want to talk about it now?" Carol asked. She sat down at the table and handed Michonne a bowl of peaches.

Michonne didn't really know what there was to talk about, at least not yet. She looked at the peaches and then looked at Carol with an odd look. She'd never gotten fruit for breakfast. The canned fruit, when they were able to find it, was sacred. Everyone loved it and it was reserved for when they wanted to celebrate things.

Carol smiled. That was one of the facial expressions she was used to seeing Michonne wear. Michonne seldom asked anyone anything. That expression always did the asking for her.

"The baby didn't like oatmeal, but I know you like fruit, so I thought you could try it out. At least it'll be more pleasant coming back up if the baby doesn't like it either." Carol said.

Michonne really wished Carol would stop saying the word "baby". It was making her stomach feel far less settled than it was before and she was getting sore from all the retching. Still, the peaches were delicious, and he she was thankful for that, even if she'd regret eating them later.

"So do you want to talk about it?" Carol offered again.

Michonne knew what Carol wanted. She wanted one of those feel good moments where they chat back and forth about their feelings and emotions. This had the potential to be one of those "best friend" chats that's best accompanied by some kind of coffee beverage at a café. Michonne looked around. This wasn't a café. It was some kind of coffee break room in a prison. And this wasn't a fancy coffee beverage; it was a bowl of canned peaches.

"I don't really feel like talking right now, but thank you for the peaches." Michonne said. To her surprise Carol looked a little disappointed.

"Ok. I'm here if you decide you want to." Carol said. She sat there for a minute longer. "You need to tell Daryl." She added.

"We have watch together." Michonne said. She was guessing that he was already up there. He hadn't come to bed the night before.

Carol nodded. "And you need to talk to Hershel." She said. Michonne made a face. "Are you getting sick?"

"Maybe." Michonne said. At any rate, delicious though they were, Michonne decided not to take any more chances with the peaches. She stood up, picked up her katana and started toward the tower, with absolutely no idea how she was going to tell Daryl.

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Michonne walked in the watchtower, trying to steady her breathing and still trying to figure out how she was going to tell Daryl. He was in his customary position, sitting on the floor, leaning loosely against the wall. He smiled when she came in.

"Hey you." He said. "I didn't expect you up. Feeling better?"

Michonne sat down in the chair, leaning her katana against the wall. No, at this moment she was feeling much worse. Her mouth was dry, despite the cold she was sweating, her heart was pounding, and she really wanted to vomit. She propped her elbows on her legs and put her head in her hands.

Daryl was worried. Michonne didn't look good at all.

"Hey, 'Chonne, I can handle watch by myself, you know." Daryl said. He thought maybe she should go lie down. It was obvious that she wasn't over whatever bug had jumped on her and it worried Daryl. He'd never really been good at knowing what to do for sick people. If you were hurt, he knew how to patch up some things, but he didn't know what to do for sick people. Carol knew what to do for sick people, and Hershel knew what to do for sick people, but that wasn't Daryl's forte. That's one reason that he hadn't slept in the cell with Michonne last night. He didn't think she'd want him there, and he didn't really know what to with her being sick. It made him feel helpless. "I'm serious," he said after seeing that she wasn't responding to him "I think you maybe need to go back to bed."

Michonne was trying very hard to figure out how to tell Daryl about this. She hadn't actually said it out loud now, and she realized that maybe she should have practiced a few times before she walked in here. What was the right way? When she'd told her husband she was pregnant, they had been trying to start a family. They had a future planned out, and though it didn't go as expected, their future at that time had involved wanting babies. She had told him both times the same way…meeting him at the door, grinning from excitement and offering him the stick. She remembered being so happy then.

_They hadn't actually ever said "I love you" before and now she had to figure out how to tell him that she was bringing a baby into this? _

"'Chonne, you OK?" Daryl asked. "Do I need to get Carol or Hershel?" She was just sitting there with her head in her hands, swaying back and forth a little. Then Daryl realized she was doing something that he'd only seen her do once before. Michonne was crying. Daryl didn't know what to do. Was it something he'd done? Was it something he even knew about?

That was something people did these days from time to time. Sometimes they would just cry. It was like somewhere, at some point, a dam just broke. You could only hold it together for a while, but eventually you just _broke_. Most of them understood that when they were with each other and the reality of it all just sunk in around them and they started to cry. The truth is that they were trying their best to make this new life seem _normal_, and sometimes they had moments where it did seem that way. Sometime it even seemed pleasant, but sometimes it just got to be too much. Daryl wondered if that was what was wrong with Michonne.

He pulled himself up and went over to her, dragging the other watch chair next to hers. He hesitated a moment before placing his hand on her back. He leaned in to try to look at her face, but she had it mostly hidden.

"It's OK." Daryl said. "It's OK." He didn't know what else to say to her.

"No, Daryl, it's not OK." She finally said, trying to dry up the tears a little. Daryl fumbled around in his pocket and found one of his handkerchiefs. He offered it to her.

"It looks dirty, but Carol washed it." He said, realizing that the discolored handkerchief probably didn't look like anything she wanted to put on her face.

Michonne dried her face and blew her nose. Daryl was just looking at her with the same sweet concerned face that he always made when he thought she was going to tell him something important.

"Daryl…" Michonne started. She still didn't know what to say. She really wanted to just spit it out, but she felt like she couldn't do that. She felt the peaches rising in her throat and she swallowed hard, not wanting to get sick again. "Daryl, I…I've got a problem." She said.

Daryl was a little struck by the comment. A problem? Hell they all had problems. What kind of problem could she have that Daryl didn't know about? Problems were everything these days. The Governor who hadn't reared his ugly head since the last attack, but was probably waiting just over the next hill was a problem. Walkers were a problem, fences down were a problem, shortages were a problem, that leak that had appeared in Beth's cell last week was a problem…they all _had problems_. If there was anything they could do these days, it was _handle problems._

"What's wrong, 'Chonne?" He asked, taking one of her hands in his. "We'll fix it."

"Daryl…I'm going to have a baby." Michonne said. She immediately looked down at her legs. She really didn't want to see his facial expression.

Daryl sat there a minute, letting it soak in. Michonne was going to have a baby? _They were going to have a baby._ Daryl had always wanted children, back before the world went to Hell. He'd always had this sort of idea where he cleaned up his act, got a real job, married some amazing woman, and they'd always had four kids…they were always two girls and two boys. The best thing about his dream was that Daryl was a good father, and he was a good husband. In his dreams he never hit his wife the way that his father had pounded on his mother for no good reason. He never hit his kids, and he did things with them…dad things…the things his dad had never done with him. He'd always thought that's how it would end up. The world they lived in now sucked, but Daryl _wanted_ to be a father.

Michonne had gone completely stiff. Daryl became aware of this.

"Damn, girl," he said "I thought you said you had a problem." Daryl put his arm around her, pulling her toward him, but she was so frozen for the moment that she barely moved. "Hey, this ain't no problem." Daryl added. Still no response. "And _you _ain't the only one in this, the way I see it."

Michonne wasn't sure what was going on right now. She didn't know what she had expected, but Daryl's tone was not what she had expected. She thought maybe he'd be angry, or maybe he'd be upset. Daryl did not sound like he was either of those things. He sounded like he was actually happy. Michonne didn't know if she wanted to look up or not. Finally, Daryl placed his hand under her chin and pulled her face toward him.

"And don't you be callin' my kid no problem anymore." Daryl said. He was actually _smiling._ Michonne didn't know what to say, but the kiss that Daryl planted on her lips told her there wasn't much to say.

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"Carol said you wanted to talk to me?" Hershel said, hobbling into the room. Daryl had already sent Michonne down there, excusing her from watch until she'd talked to him. Michonne was feeling a little bit better about the situation. It was far from ideal, but Daryl was about as happy as she'd ever seen him. She didn't know why, but he was really excited. She still wasn't excited, and she was the one that was going to have the baby, but his happiness had lifted her spirits a little.

"I'm pregnant." Michonne said.

Hershel hadn't expected that at all. He'd known that Daryl and Michonne had been pretty active. The entire prison knew that, but for some reason it had never entered his mind that Michonne could get pregnant. He'd thought about Glenn and Maggie, and he'd thought about Rachel and Rick, but he'd never really let himself imagine that Michonne could be a mother.

"I see." He said. "Any idea how far along you are?"

Michonne shrugged. She didn't know how far along she was. She didn't even know what month it was. "What month is it?" She asked. It was funny, since all this had happened those kinds of things didn't matter anymore in life. You needed to know it was getting cold, so you might need to think about shelter and food, but that was about all you needed. Days of the week didn't matter; months of the year didn't matter. Every day was just like the one before, try to survive and keep your eyes open for what was next.

Michonne's question took Hershel off guard and he scratched his head. "Well, I don't know." He said. "From the weather, I guess it's probably December, or maybe January."

Michonne shrugged again. That really didn't help much. Come to think of it, she didn't really even know how long she and Daryl had been an item. In the world they knew before, they might have had an anniversary. They might have gone out to some nice dinner in a restaurant somewhere…nowadays thinking about things like that was about like contemplating the existence of aliens had been to her before. It was just too out there for her to really imagine.

"Well, I can try to guess. I should be able to feel the baby enough to give me some idea" Hershel said. You'll need to lie down for me." Hershel hadn't ever really examined Michonne other than with a few wounds. His only real practice with pregnancy had come from handling Lori's, but he had learned a few things.

Michonne took off her cloak and peeled off the jacket she was wearing underneath it, shivering a little at the coldness of the room. As an afterthought she unbuttoned her pants and rolled them down enough for him. She got on the table. While Hershel prodded her and tried to find the baby, she stared at the ceiling. She hated this kind of thing. She hated having anyone touch her when she wasn't in the mood to be touched, and his pressing wasn't helping her with the already nauseous state that she was in.

"I don't know, exactly. Hershel said, but I can tell you're under 12 weeks…could be ten, could be eight." Hershel said finally. Michonne sat up, buttoning her pants. "You need to make sure you're eating enough, drinking enough water, and you'll need to ask Carol about vitamins. I know we had some around here."

"Anything else?" Michonne asked.

"You'll need to slow down some." Hershel said. "You're going to be tired. You're going to need to adjust your pace. No heavy lifting."

"Yeah, I know." Michonne said.

"Beg your pardon?" Hershel asked.

"I know. Take your vitamins, get your rest, and eat your food. I've done this before." Michonne said.

Hershel was taken aback. No one at the prison really knew anything about Michonne. She hadn't exactly been one to come waving her past around at everyone.

"I've been pregnant before." Michonne said. Hershel stopped for a moment. Michonne had been a mother. He didn't want to push her to tell him anymore than she'd already said. That was the thing about their lives before. No one wanted to push anyone any further than they wanted to go.

"Did your pregnancy go well?" Hershel asked, somewhat timidly. He wasn't really sure what to do with a Michonne that was opening up to him, or was at least speaking to him.

"They both did." She said.

So she'd been a mother to two children. Now Hershel really wondered what she'd been like. They all saw her now as the closed down, unstoppable, and at times not human person. Now he knew that in a distant life she had bore two children. He couldn't imagine that world any longer, and he certainly couldn't see Michonne in it. Maybe there was something to her and Daryl. They'd often talked about it around the breakfast table and wondered what could make the two gravitate towards one another when Michonne was so…untouchable.

"I'm sorry to have to ask, but how did you deliver them?" This was information Hershel needed. He needed to know how prepared he needed to be and how careful they needed to be. They hadn't been careful enough with Lori.

"I mean…" Michonne hesitated, for a moment remembering what the delivery of her girls had been like. "I had the good drugs, but everything went fine." She finished.

Hershel sighed a sigh of relief. He was also surprised that Michonne had smiled for a moment. Not only had she been a mother in that other life, but it looked like she had been a _happy_ mother.

"No cesarean sections?" He asked.

"No, nothing like that." Michonne said. It had been so easy with her girls. From the moment that she had found out she was pregnant it had been amazing…they had been amazing and wonderful…_until the world had changed her life for good._ Michonne tried to put the memory out of her head.

That was good news. "Well, I'm sure this is going to be just fine." Hershel said. He really wasn't too worried. Everything these days was unpredictable, but this didn't seem like it was going to be too big of an obstacle.

Michonne got off the table and put her jacket and cloak back on.

"Am I free to go?" She asked.

"I'd say so." Hershel said. "Oh, and Michonne?"

Michonne turned around.

"Congratulations." Hershel added. Michonne just nodded at him and stepped out of the room.


	16. Chapter 16

"We have to tell everyone." Michonne whispered.

"Yeah." Daryl said. He was kneading her shoulders. Even though it was the middle of the day, the two had been in bed for at least an hour. After his watch, Daryl had come down to find Michonne in the cell, just sitting on the bed with the trash can between her knees.

Michonne couldn't help that she was tense, and the massage was keeping the nausea at bay. She was grateful that she hadn't had to ask Daryl to do it; he had just _started_ doing it while she told him about talking to Hershel. Michonne knew that Hershel and Carol would keep it to themselves until they told everyone, but she also knew that Carol was busting to talk about it and the gossip chain in the prison was relatively short.

Daryl had spent the entire watch daydreaming. In his daydreams, anything was possible. He tried to ground them in the day to day reality in which he lived to make them more plausible scenarios, but so much snuck in from what he used to know that it didn't always work out that way. The biggest problem was that in all of his daydreams the kid, who was sometimes a boy and sometimes a girl, was already at least four years old and walking and talking. It held his hand a lot and kissed him on the cheek. His reality right now was much different. Instead what he had was Michonne, sitting in front of him, with her face in a trash can.

Daryl didn't know much about pregnant women. He'd been around Lori some, but not enough to really pay attention. What he did know was that they got big bellies that everyone touched. He also knew they were moody and ate weird things. So far he couldn't say any of those things fit Michonne. She didn't look pregnant, and around here there wasn't much variety in the food, not that Daryl had seen her eat much of anything in the past few days. He couldn't say she was moody, either, because Michonne was always moody.

Daryl stopped massaging Michonne's shoulders. She put the trash can on the floor, feeling better now that she was totally relaxed. He slipped around her and sat beside her, taking one of her hands and nervously running his finger up and down each of her fingers.

"You said Hershel could feel the baby." Daryl said.

"Yeah." Michonne said.

"Could I?" Daryl asked. Michonne thought about it for a minute.

"I don't know what he was doing, Daryl. I couldn't tell you if you'd found the baby or just some random internal organ." She said. Daryl looked disappointed, but he did kind of snicker at her. "Besides, if you go poking around, I might get sick again."

"When ya gonna get big?" Daryl asked. He tried to picture what Michonne would look like pregnant. He was having a hard time picturing it, but he thought he'd like it when he saw it.

"I don't know." Michonne said. She remembered that she had been big with both of her daughters. They had been large, healthy girls. She also remembered feeling like she ballooned up over night. It seemed almost like one night she went to bed not feeling pregnant at all and the next day she woke up feeling like she had eaten a whole cantaloupe. She was sure it had actually been a slower progression, but that's how it had felt to her. She didn't like how much this was making her remember…how much it was making her _feel_.

Daryl could see on Michonne's face that she didn't want to talk about it anymore, and even though he _really_ wanted to talk about it, he decided not to push her. Instead he just pulled her to him and she rested her head on his chest.

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They could hear Maggie coming long before she got to the cell. Being cramped up in the prison, forced to spend most of their free time inside because of the cold, had given people a little more energy than they knew what to do with and Maggie released hers in spurts of wild silliness. She was apparently running, from the sound of her feet pounding on the floor, and dragging something across the bars. Daryl could hear her getting closer, like a train coming down a track.

"Chow time!" Maggie said, suddenly appearing outside their cell. She pressed her face between two of the bars and hung there oddly for a moment. Daryl snickered at her. He couldn't decide if she looked insane or looked like she was about to break out in a dance.

"I heard ya." He said. "We're comin'."

"Better get it while it's hot. Carol made a feast." Maggie said, lingering at the bars a second longer before trotting off, dragging what Daryl now knew was a wrench down the other bars.

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Everyone at the table was in good spirits. Daryl hadn't seen plates piled this high with food in a while. Something about the quiet of the past few months, coupled with the bounty of food before them, made everyone seem so much lighter tonight. Carol was even busy passing around some of the beer that they still had stored up.

Rick and Rachel were the last two to join them at the table. Two of the new people, who Daryl now knew were named Josh and Brenda, had just taken over watch, having eaten early.

"What's the special occasion?" Rick asked, sitting at the table and accepting a plate from Carol who had been listening to a funny story that Glenn was telling about his life before. She didn't respond to Rick. Instead she turned her attention back to Glenn and laughed at the end of his story, continuing to pass out plates and offer seconds to anyone who had gobbled through a portion of anything.

"I don't know." Carol finally said to Rick. "I guess you can call it Christmas." She paused for a minute, smiling at everyone. "We haven't had a Christmas in a long time."

Michonne knew what Carol was doing, and she was a little thankful. There was nothing like a full stomach to make everything seem better, and the announcement they were going to have to make had the potential of either being taken as good news or bad. Still, Michonne was nervous about telling them all. This would mean another mouth to feed, another person to protect, and it would mean, at least for a while, that she wasn't going to be the fighter that they had relied on her to be. So far that had been her place in the group. Now she didn't know where she would fit or if they would be able to accept her new role.

Carol put a bowl down beside Michonne's plate. It was the rest of the peaches she'd been eating that morning. Glenn's eyes got big and he immediately reached across the table and took a slice out of the bowl, cramming the entire thing in his mouth. Carol reached over Michonne and gently slapped him on the head.

"No snatching food." She said in the same tone she would have used to scold Sophia for such behavior.

Glenn, who was still chewing, was smiling through his chewing. He swallowed the peach.

"Hey, I didn't get any and I was the one that was up on the roof the whole day fixing Beth's stupid hole." He protested, still smiling.

"The hole wasn't my fault." Beth said. She'd heard enough complaining from Glenn about that hole that she was sick of it. She hadn't asked him to fix it, either. Everyone knew it was Rick that assigned jobs, and Glenn had been the one that he decided was best at patching up roofs. "I didn't get any fruit either." She added after a moment.

Michonne silently slid the bowl of fruit toward Beth. There was more than enough food at the table, and she knew that favoritism by Carol wouldn't buy her any popularity.

Carol sat down at the table finally and took a beer from the ones she had put in the middle. She was dying for Michonne to make the announcement, but it didn't look like Michonne was going to do it. She was just staring at her food, taking bites every now and again. From the look on Daryl's face she could tell that there was no problem there. He looked just as happy as everyone else at the table. Carol ate a little of her dinner, listening to the rambling conversation that was going on. Finally she couldn't stand it anymore.

"Um, don't we have something we need to talk about?" Carol finally said, looking at Daryl and Michonne.

Herschel cleared his throat and everyone at the table got quiet, waiting patiently to hear whatever it was they needed to hear.

Daryl looked at Michonne. She looked like a deer in headlights. He realized she wasn't going to be able to make this announcement. Now everyone was staring at them, and that didn't seem like it was going to make her more comfortable. Daryl decided he would handle the announcement for her.

"Guys…" Daryl said, unable to keep himself from grinning, "we're gonna have a baby."

The reaction at the table was silence at first. No one moved. Daryl stared at them, and they stared back at him. Everyone had even quit chewing, and Maggie was stopped with a forkful of green beans partway to her mouth. The only one in the room who was moving at all was Judith, wiggling on Hershel's lap and sucking on a bottle.

"Well, I for one am excited for you two." Carol said, breaking the silence and returning everyone back to their animated state. One by one the congratulations trickled out of the group. Many of them were half hearted, but at least they were offered.

Michonne wasn't offended that people weren't exactly overjoyed about the announcement. They knew it was a mistake…no one would purposefully plan to have a baby right now…so how much congratulations could you really offer someone for a mistake that had just sort of _happened to them_? They were all looking at her a little oddly now. Michonne had long since figured out that no one in the group really knew what to do with her. It was obvious that they didn't really view her as a woman, at least not the kind of woman that Carol or Maggie or Beth was. They saw her as something a little less woman than that, and yet here she was, currently in the most _womanly condition_ that she could be in.

Still, everyone looked like they were going to accept it, they just needed to process it, and Michonne couldn't blame them for that. It still hadn't sunk in entirely to her, and she was pretty sure Daryl that it hadn't sunk in entirely to Daryl either. Carol seemed like the only that had accepted it completely.

Michonne's main concern was Rick. Michonne knew that Rick didn't really like her. He _tolerated_ her at best. She couldn't read his facial expression well right now, but she didn't miss the crease between his eyebrows, and she wondered what was going on his mind.

Glenn was in shock. He and Maggie had been very careful to avoid her getting pregnant, but they had talked about what would happen if she did get pregnant. It was something they didn't want, though; because Glenn had admitted to himself that he didn't think he'd be able to handle the strain. He would want to take care of her, above everything else, and these days taking care of somebody didn't always work out the way they wanted. If everything were normal, he would have loved the idea of having children with Maggie, but everything wasn't normal and he knew that if she were pregnant she'd be _at risk_. All kinds of things could happen, and he would go crazy knowing that he couldn't control all of the risks. No one wanted their loved ones threatened in any way.

Glenn reached across the table and slid the bowl of peaches back toward Michonne, smiling a little nervously. Michonne smiled at the gesture.

"Thanks Glenn, but really I'm full." She said.


	17. Chapter 17

AN: I'd like to apologize again for spelling and grammar errors. I do try to check behind myself, but I do miss things.

I'd also like to throw in a warning for any readers that don't like AU/OCC/OC material. This might be a good point for you to turn back. As I'm planning this and future chapters, I realize more and more that those things are definitely going to happen and I'd hate to ruin anyone's day by throwing you a curve ball about your favorite character(s) or about the way the story is headed and you feel like I didn't warn you.

That being said, I hope you enjoy.

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"Damn it!" Michonne growled. She kicked the dresser in front of her.

"You goin' through somethin' there, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked tying his boots.

"I can't get my damn pants buttoned." Michonne snapped back at him. Daryl laughed a little and regretted it from the facial expression she gave him. It had been two weeks since she'd found out, and it still didn't seem real to her. A part of her kept trying to deny it, but there was no denying it. If Hershel was correct, she was about twelve weeks. Her morning sickness was starting to fade into only a minor nuisance that arose from to time, and she'd been forcing herself into her clothes. Today her pants had apparently reached their limit because she absolutely could not force the two sides to meet, less likely actually button. She sighed again.

"Why don't you just wear bigger pants?" Daryl asked. Michonne stopped fidgeting with the button.

"This is my biggest pair…I can't exactly run down to the mall and pick up some more right now." Michonne said. She pulled on a shirt and signed again. "Nothing fits right now that I got fat."

Daryl reached over and pulled her to where he was sitting. He gently kissed her on the stomach, just at the point where her pants wouldn't button.

"You didn't get fat, 'Chonne. You're just a little fluffier than you were…and I like it." Daryl said. Michonne sighed again. "Just leave the pants unbuttoned, that's what Lori did most of the time."

"None of my shirts are long enough to cover it." Michonne said. Now it was Daryl's turn to sigh. He got up, dug through his drawer in the dresser, and handed her one of his winter shirts.

"Really, Daryl?" Michonne said taking the shirt reluctantly. "It's red plaid. That's really more a you look."

"Tell me, Michonne, what are all the trendy pregnant women wearing these days?" Daryl asked. "Listen, wear the shirt, don't wear the shirt, I don't care. I'm going to check the parameters. I need a little fresh air." Daryl kissed Michonne on the forehead and left her standing there holding the shirt.

Hershel had told him not to take it to heart. He'd said that she probably didn't even make sense to herself half the time right now. It was just hormones. Daryl tried to remember that, but she'd become so emotional that sometimes it drove him crazy. She cried, but she wouldn't tell him why…sometimes she was so horny that he thought she was going to attack him and other times she didn't want him to touch her…and she got irritated over the dumbest shit ever. _Her clothes didn't fit_. Daryl knew he wasn't an expert on these things, but he had kind of thought that was an expectation when you were pregnant. In any case, he was tired of being in the prison, so a walk was just what he needed.

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Michonne shuffled into the living area where Carol, Maggie, Rachel, and Brenda were filling up supply boxes for everyone out of several bags in the middle of the room. She stood there a minute, watching them and trying to decide if she felt like helping or if she'd rather see if someone wanted to be relieved from watch. Neither was an appealing option, but there wasn't anything else to do right now.

"Hello, sunshine." Carol said when she noticed Michonne. Rachel and Maggie smiled. Brenda looked a little worried. Michonne knew that Brenda was a little afraid of her, and right now she was fine with that being the case. Finally she decided to join them sat down in the circle to start passing things out to the various labeled boxes.

"Michonne, don't take this the wrong way, but you look…" Maggie started.

"Like Paul Bunyan?" Michonne finished for her.

"Well…that too. I was going to say awkward." Maggie said, chunking a tube of toothpaste into the box next to Michonne.

"It's Daryl's shirt, and it doesn't fit…nothing fits." Michonne said.

"We've got a ton of boxes of random clothes in the storage room." Carol said. "I'll go in there later and see if I can't find you some stuff. It might not be great, but at least there's got to be something that will fit." Carol said. Michonne shook her head and continued packing boxes.

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Daryl had walked about five laps around the entire parameter of the fence. He wasn't even pretending to be checking the fence anymore, he was just walking. It felt good to stretch his legs and the exercise was keeping him from noticing the cold. He didn't know how long it had been since he'd been outside for more than the few minutes it took to do the tasks of their daily mundane routines.

Daryl wasn't surprised when he saw Rick coming toward him. Rick was also a fan of walks around the parameter when the sitting still and the stale air was killing him.

"All quiet?" Rick called out as he got closer.

"All quiet." Daryl said.

_That's the good and bad of life now._ Daryl thought. While quiet meant that you had a better chance of surviving to see another day, quiet also meant that you were going to be bored. Maggie and Glenn had been thrilled after one of their final trips to town before they holed up for winter. They'd brought back everything they could find, but what they were most excited about was that they had taken time to steal every board game, book, and other random toy that they could find. Literally any entertainment was better than none.

Rick caught up to Daryl and fell into step with him. Daryl could tell that Rick wanted to talk to him about something, but he was holding back. Rick had a way of doing that. He'd start like he was going to speak and then stop.

"What's up, man?" Daryl finally asked.

"Daryl, it's this whole thing you've got going on with Michonne…" Rick said.

"What do you mean "thing"?" Daryl asked. He didn't exactly like Rick's tone of voice. It reminded him a little of the tone of voice his mother had used on him as a child the time he brought the puppy home. His father had gotten pissed about that one, and the puppy had disappeared.

"Well, I mean when you first started this, I thought that it was a good thing for you. I know how it can get. We all need a little stress relief at the end of the day…but now I'm not so sure." Rick said.

"Stress relief? You think I'm with 'Chonne to _get off_?" Daryl couldn't believe that Rick would think that.

"Look, Daryl, I'm not trying to judge you or her, but it's just that this is a bad situation, and I'm concerned about you. I just want to make sure you're not making any bad choices here." Rick said. Daryl walked along quietly, sometimes glancing in Rick's direction, but most of the time looking at the ground. "Look, Daryl, I depend on you. The group depends on you. The only way that we've made it this far is by depending on each other."

"Don't look to me like nothin's changed." Daryl said.

"So it hasn't changed?" Rick asked.

"What's changed, Rick?" Daryl asked. Rick was a man that constantly surprised Daryl. Rick had changed after Shane died, and it wasn't for the better. Rick had changed even more after they lost Lori, and ever since the Governor had reared his ugly head, Rick was sometimes a little hard to figure out. Daryl had thought Rachel would be good for Rick, but not much had changed there. Daryl decided maybe it was Rick who had found someone that he could use for "stress relief".

"You mean that I can still count on you?" Rick asked.

"Well, yeah." Daryl said.

"The Governor's still out there and we're going to see a lot more trouble out of him. Eventually we're going to have to leave the prison and we don't know what we're going to run into out there. I need to know that your loyalties haven't changed. That's a bad thing to find out in the middle of something." Rick stopped walking and Daryl stopped beside him.

"My loyalties are to the group, and 'Chonne is part of the group now." Daryl said.

"Look, Daryl, I know she's part of the group now…but she's not predictable. All I really know about her is that none of this shit would have happened if she'd never come here." Rick said. "How do I know she's not just going to up and leave once we get the Governor off her back and that you're not going to go trotting off after her?"

"She wouldn't do that. She ain't gonna leave unless you make her leave." Daryl said. "If it hadn't been for 'Chonne, Andrea wouldn't have lived as long as she did. The Governor's a fuckin' lunatic who'd have found us eventually anyway, and he'd have wanted to kill us for some other stupid reason I'm sure."

"I'm just saying that right now she's just a drain on us. She's one of the weakest links, and if it comes down to a fight I wouldn't want you doing anything stupid. You know as well as I do it's every man for himself." Rick said.

"She's not no fuckin' weak link, she's pregnant with my kid!" Daryl said. "Is that how you feel about Lil' Asskicker? She's just a weak link that you don't need to worry about?"

Daryl was sorry he brought it up. It was no secret that Rick doubted the baby was even his and he wasn't overly fond of her. He had essentially given the child over completely to the group. Daryl couldn't remember the last time he'd seen Rick even hold her.

"I'm just saying that I don't want you to do anything stupid if it comes down to it." Rick said.

Daryl didn't really know if he loved Michonne, because he wasn't sure that he knew what love was. What he did know is that she was the most important thing in the world to him. She mattered above everything else. He knew that for him, winning one of her smiles was the greatest feeling that he'd ever experienced, and that was just for a smile. He knew what Rick was insinuating, but he also knew beyond a shadow of a doubt if someone told him that they were going to kill one of them, Daryl would tell them that he was ready to die in a minute because he didn't want to live in a world without Michonne. For a minute, Daryl wondered if that's how Rick had felt about Lori. If that _was_ how Rick had felt about her, Daryl thought he could forgive him a little for having become so doubtful of everyone, and so callous to the losses they suffered since her death. He'd even been passive to Carl. Daryl hoped he'd never have to face losing Michonne, but if he did, he wasn't sure what kind of person he would become. Maybe he'd become like Rick, or maybe he'd become as crazy as the Governor…but he knew he wouldn't care about anything in the world anymore.

"Rick, if you're asking if I'd risk my life for her, I would." Daryl said. Rick looked at him. He shook his head and sighed.

"You'd be better off without that in your life." Rick said. He walked off before Daryl could say anything and Daryl went in the other direction, pissed off that Rick couldn't seem to understand what Michonne meant to him.

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Carol brought a bag of clothes to Michonne's cell.

"I didn't know what would fit, but I brought a little of everything. We didn't have any maternity clothes, but I did bring some larger sizes that we might can make work. Beth can sew pretty well, so we might even make some things you like." Carol said, holding out the bag. Michonne took it and thanked her.

Carol sat on the bed while Michonne looked through the bag.

"You didn't seem the kind that liked dresses, so I didn't put any of those in there." Carol said.

"They aren't very practical." Michonne said.

"Not when you're killing Walkers, but you're not going to be doing that for a while." Carol said. Michonne didn't respond. "I know you're not thrilled about this, but it's going to work out fine. We'll make the best of it."

"The glass is always half full?" Michonne asked.

"It doesn't matter if it's half full or half empty. If you're thirsty, you drink it. That's how life goes these days." Carol said.

Michonne nodded.

"The world isn't a safe place for babies anymore." Michonne said after a moment.

"The world isn't a safe place for any of us anymore. We just do the best we can." Carol said.

Carol wanted to know more about Michonne. Over the past couple of weeks, Michonne had only slightly opened up to her a little, softening her expression at times. Carol could understand that Michonne wouldn't be happy with her current situation. She seemed like the kind of person that didn't want to _need_ anyone, and this pregnancy did make her need more from others than she wanted to accept. Carol also knew, from her comment, that Michonne had been a mother once, and if Carol's intuition was correct, she thought Michonne would probably be worried about what was going to happen here. She didn't know how Michonne's child had died, but because she had arrived at the prison injured and childless, Carol was certain that it had. She had lost a child too, and knew that to a mother, losing a child was life changing. Carol had coped by taking on the group as her child, and now Michonne in particular. Carol was grateful that Michonne accepted her mothering, and seemed to appreciate it, no matter how little she might call attention to it. She also understood that Michonne had coped by trying to make herself impenetrable. She was probably very afraid that she would love this child, and she would lose it. Carol couldn't guarantee her that it wouldn't happen, but she could at least offer to be there for her if it did.

"Yeah…" Michonne said. "The best we can."

Carol stood up. "When you're ready, come to the kitchen. I'll make you some warm milk and honey. It'll help you with your baby blues."

Michonne nodded, watching as Carol left the cell. She went back to sorting the clothes by size.


	18. Chapter 18

Most of the people had gone to bed, but Daryl wasn't sleepy yet. He and a few others were sitting around the living room, listening to Maggie read aloud from a book. Daryl and Michonne shared one of the mattresses that they used as couches, with him sitting on the far end of it and her lying down with her head in his lap. This was fairly common at night and had become the closest thing to television that they had.

Glenn was already asleep, stretched out on one of the mattresses. Rick and Rachel occupied another mattress, both sitting side by side, but not touching. Maggie shared another with Carol who was halfheartedly reading over Maggie's shoulder as the story continued on.

Daryl wasn't interested in this book. It was a chick book and had a lot of words that he didn't understand, and a lot of "heaving bosoms". He could easily understand how Glenn had fallen asleep. From the looks of the others, they weren't far behind. The only reason that Daryl knew that Michonne was still awake was because he was entertaining himself by tickling her face and ear with one of her dreadlocks and she kept swatting at it every now and again when he must have hit an especially ticklish spot. It was irritating enough to be funny to Daryl, but apparently not enough to make Michonne move, which was the perfect balance in Daryl's opinion.

These quiet nights were nice, but Daryl worried that they were drawing to an end, and he knew that Rick was worried too. It was starting to warm up a little outside, with the promise that it would be warming up even more. They had already unanimously agreed that the Governor would probably be in touch with them soon, it was just a matter of when and how. Daryl hoped he sent one of his men for what Rick called "negotiations", but they were all more than a little nervous that they would wake up to find another hoard of Walkers knocking at their door before breakfast.

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Daryl was on watch alone. Tyreese had been with him earlier, but Daryl had excused him. Things were quiet and Daryl didn't really want the company. He would have preferred if Michonne had been on duty with him, but she had already told Maggie that she would help her. They were supposed to be finding a place for a garden and working on getting it cleaned up so that it would be ready for them to plant seeds when Hershel said it was time. Daryl had watched them through his binoculars and what it really looked like they were doing was wandering around aimlessly, staring at the ground. He was fairly certain that neither had a clue what they were doing, and he hoped Hershel would help them before they wasted anymore time.

As Daryl surveyed the landscape again, he could see someone walking in the distance. At first he thought it was just another wandering Walker, they had begun to see a lot more of them now and he was guessing they were migrating through or whatever Walkers did, but now it was closer and he could see that it was moving much quicker than any Walker would have.

Daryl put the binoculars down and picked up the long range rifle that they kept in the watch tower. The scope on it was better than the binoculars. He looked through it. Yep, it was a man, and he was carrying a sheet or a towel.

_It was one of the Governor's men._ Daryl knew that every time one of them came for negotiations, they were always carrying some kind of white cloth. They're sign for "peace" since the only wanted to negotiate. _The bastards never came to negotiate. They only came to make demands. The Governor was a coward and didn't have the balls to come himself._

Daryl should go get the others and alert Rick that someone was coming, but he knew what would happen. They would go down to the gate, let the man in, and they would discuss what the Governor wanted and the fact that any refusal to comply would result in another attack of whatever manner the Governor had cooked up this time. Each time they'd done this, the man would leave empty handed and a few days later some kind of attack would happen.

Rick hadn't been too stable lately, and Daryl wasn't comfortable with him. If he tried to hand Michonne over, Daryl would have to fight him. There wasn't any telling what would happen then.

Daryl did the only thing that he could think to do. He raised the gun and waited as the man walked into range.

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When the gunshot rang out, no one really knew what to do. A quick look around didn't reveal any threats, but Maggie and Michonne, unarmed, ran back toward the prison. Rick and Glenn ran out, brushing past them.

Daryl was coming out of the watch tower.

"Tyreese, go up." Rick said, trotting over to Daryl. Tyreese obliged him and went to take Daryl's place.

"What was that?" Rick asked.

"One of the Governor's patsies." Daryl said.

"Alone?" Rick asked.

"There was only one shot, weren't there?" Daryl responded.

"Was he coming to negotiate?" Rick asked.

"No, he was comin' to tell us the Governor's on his way. We should expect him in a few days." Daryl said. "And he'll be short one man." He added, turning away from Rick and walking toward the prison.

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Rick had stomped around the courtyard for a while. Inside the prison no one was talking, least of all Daryl. They were all sitting in the living room looking at each other. They knew what this meant. This meant that _something_ was going to happen…unfortunately there was no way of knowing _what_ was going to happen or exactly when.

When Rick did finally enter the prison he looked around the room, rubbed his face nervously.

"Table meeting now." He said. Daryl, Hershel, Glenn, and Josh got up to join him. Michonne also got to her feet. Rick turned to her. "Table meeting…just the men."

"Bullshit." Michonne said. "Whatever you say in there affects all of us. We all should get to have our say."

Rick looked like he wanted to hit her, but Michonne didn't flinch.

"I'd like to be part of it…" Maggie said from across the room. "I mean if the Governor's coming, he's coming for all of us."

"They're right, you know." Glenn said.

Rick looked back at Michonne.

"I'm not under any illusions about what you _want_ to do Rick. I just want my say." She said.

Rick finally agreed and everyone went into the kitchen, getting as comfortable as they possibly could.

"We know he's coming back, and we know it's soon." Rick said.

"I prob'ly bought us a little more time. He's gotta realize that guy ain't comin' back." Daryl said.

"We don't know what he's going to do. We don't know what's at stake here." Rick said.

"We know exactly what's at stake." Daryl said. "Everything's at stake. That's why we stand our ground. The assholes got one less man now; we can handle him and his so called army."

"We haven't exactly got the greatest army ourselves." Rick said.

"We took down over a hundred Walkers, Rick. Over a hundred of 'em." Daryl said. "I ain't afraid of seven assholes with guns."

"You don't know that there's only seven. He could have been building his numbers all winter. We don't know many survivors are out there." Rick glared at Michonne and she glared back at him.

"Then we kill however many of them come." Michonne said. "We've got no other choice. The Governor isn't going to leave you alone, Rick, not even if I walked out there and right into his arms. He'd just tie me up and turn right back around and come back for the rest of you."

"That's easy to say, Michonne, when we don't know how many people are coming or what they're bringing with them." Rick said. "It's also easy for you to say...we'll be fighting _your_ battle."

"If it comes down to a fight, I'm fighting too." Michonne said.

"Michonne, in your condition…" Hershel started.

"My condition isn't what's important." Michonne said. "If we don't win, he'll kill me anyway, and I'd rather die fighting than die as a part of one of his twisted games. Whether it's my battle or our battle, I'm fighting."

"Well, if it's your battle it's my battle. I'm sick of this Governor and the fucker's gonna die, one way or the other." Daryl said.

"I agree." Glenn said. "We've got no other choice. First he wants Michonne and then he'll just want someone else. This is our battle."

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"I don't like the idea of you fightin'" Daryl said. Michonne was lying beside him on her back, staring at the ceiling and he was propped on his side, leaning on his elbow. He had repeated the same phrase every few minutes for the past hour at least and Michonne hadn't responded in any way. Now she was getting tired of hearing it.

"I told you, I'm not discussing it." Michonne said. She still didn't look at him.

"What about the baby?" Daryl asked. He was relieved that she was finally talking.

"The baby will be fine." She said. "If I live, the baby will be fine."

Daryl didn't like the last part of her statement. He wished he knew where the Governor was hiding. He'd go tonight, alone if he had to, and find a way to kill him.

Michonne knew that Daryl was worried. Everyone was worried. They had no idea what was going to happen. She had watched everyone; casting glances at everyone else, wondering who might not make it out on the other side of this battle. She too had been on the giving end and the receiving end of those glances. She didn't know if she'd make it out or not, but she prayed that if she didn't it was at least a quick death, and if she did, she prayed that nothing happened to Daryl. She wasn't prepared to be without him. She had made it on her own before, but now she felt like she couldn't make it without him.

"I still don't like the idea of you fightin'." Daryl said. He reached over and started rubbing Michonne's belly.

"Well, I'm not sitting inside while everyone else fights." Michonne said. She couldn't live with herself if she did that. If someone got killed and she hadn't even been out there trying to help, she knew she'd always feel like it had been her fault or that she might have prevented it. "Here…" She said, moving Daryl's hand to a place where she could feel the baby moving. She'd felt it for a little while now, but it had only been in the past few days that Daryl could feel it, and only when it was particularly strong. Daryl held his hand there a minute. "Can you feel it?"

"Yeah, I can feel it." He said. He put his hand on her cheek and turned her face toward him. He kissed her, holding it for longer than usual, and then pulled away. "'Chonne…" He said.

"Yeah?" Michonne gazed back at him.

"I love you." Daryl said. He had never said that to a woman before. He had thought when he did say it, it would be the right word, but he didn't really feel now that it even came close to expressing what he wanted to say.

Michonne rolled over to face him. Until now neither one of them had said it. It had been something that was just _understood_, and something that they both understood that the other couldn't say.

"I love you too, Daryl." Michonne whispered back. She kissed him this time, and when she broke away she lingered there, her face close to his on the pillow.

"And I still don't like the idea of you fightin'". Daryl said suddenly. Michonne started giggling and Daryl couldn't help but laugh at her.

"Grrr…" she growled at him through her laughter, "you always have to ruin it." She said. Daryl kissed her again.


	19. Chapter 19

"Hey Xena…" Rick called out as he approached Michonne in the courtyard. She was practicing with her katana. She hadn't used it in a couple of months and she wanted to make sure those muscles weren't weakened by her break. "We're not going to be fighting the Governor in hand to hand combat." He finished, arriving next to her. "You better work on your aim." Rick offered her a gun and Michonne took it, more than a little nervous.

"My aim isn't great." She admitted. The truth was that she didn't feel she could hit the broad side of a barn, so to speak.

"I know, but you're probably bringing a knife to a gun fight." Rick said. "The Governor isn't going to storm the prison and fight us in a hand to hand battle. We're not going up against Walkers; we're going up against armed men who can shoot guns." Rick offered.

Michonne nodded, thankful that he had brought her the weapon, and decided that she would practice with it for the rest of the afternoon.

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"Can't…get…much…harder." Daryl panted in response to a muffled plea from Michonne. Finally he felt the release from Michonne that he'd been searching for, though her cries were stifled by the pillow, his right hand tangled in her hair and pushing her into it.

Michonne felt Daryl finish and relax, collapsing on top of her, exhausted. She turned her head to the side to get more air.

"Off…" She mumbled.

"What?" Daryl asked, rubbing his face on her back, his whiskers scratching her.

"Get off! You're squishing me." She gasped.

"Sorry." Daryl said, rolling off. He pulled her to him, intertwining their legs, and put his face against her neck, smelling her. She smelled like soap, and sweat, and talcum powder. As Daryl drifted off to sleep, breathing in that sweet smell, he realized it was his favorite scent in the world.

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"Knock it off and get some sleep!" Hershel called out, banging one of his crutches against the wall. The past few nights at the prison had been unbearable. The echoing of squeaking mattress coils and variations of howls and cries made it sound like the place was overrun with zoo animals and un-oiled door hinges.

The most disturbing thing to Hershel was that he had begun to identify the rhythms and cries of each of the responsible couples, having also discovered that apparently Josh and Brenda were an item, though he wasn't sure if they had been one for long or if the coupling had been brought about by the fear of a possible impending death.

He couldn't blame the couples. The tension was high and he knew that many of them were dealing with the fear that each night be the last night they were together, but he didn't think his sanity could stand much more of the noise.

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Two approaching trucks had been spotted and Rick had issued the call to arms. Daryl was the first to go out, heading to the watchtower with a long range rifle in hopes to pick off the Governor's men from a better angle. The rest would fight the best they could, from the ground.

Rick realized this plan was less than satisfactory. He didn't know how many men the Governor had or what weapons he had acquired. In the moments before they started out to begin what would probably be the final fight for a few of them, Rick surveyed the bunch. At best a few of them were "good shots", most of them just got lucky from time to time, and some would have been just as effective throwing rocks at the Governor's men.

Carl, Judith, and Hershel would be the only three that would remain inside. Rick had given Carl and Hershel weapons in the chance that somehow the Governor made his way through all of them before they had picked off his army, but Rick knew when he handed the gun to Hershel that if that were the case, the gun would be of little use. Hershel had known it too.

As they filed outside to face whatever the future might hold, Rick had to admit to himself that he was significantly worried. He would feel better if he felt like he was sending soldiers out there, but it really felt more like he was taking the Apple Dumpling Gang to war.

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Daryl watched the trucks through the scope. He realized that though they were barely in range, they were in range. He thought that if he were quick enough, he could pick the men off before they got a chance to do much damage.

They were outside the fence and there were no Walkers. _Where were the damn Walkers when you needed them?_

He tried not to focus on anything but watching the trucks, waiting for any sign of movement. He didn't want to think about everyone below, scrambling into various positions to try to get close enough without getting too close.

Even though he never took his eyes off the trucks, he didn't see any movement. Somehow he didn't see the first man until after he heard the rapid fire of the machine gun. The sound ringing out helped him find the man, but not before he had peppered the area with bullets. Daryl was able to hit him, but then the others spilled out of the truck and started running in all directions, making his job less organized than he thought it would be and more like a carnival game. That's what he had to think about this as, a carnival game that he desperately wanted to win. He couldn't think about the fact that his group was fighting down below or that they may have already lost someone. He wasn't willing to let them lose _anyone._

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Carol couldn't see everyone from her position, and the ones she could see had pretty much become indistinguishable, each trying to hide well enough that they were effectively hidden from each other as well. She knew that some people had been hit by the first round of gunfire, she'd seen at least one person out of the corner of her eye fall, and she had tried not to focus on who it had been.

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Inside, Hershel was keeping busy getting ready for the injured. He had kept Carl busy arranging extra mattresses in the living area to create a type of waiting room for the ones that were waiting on him to help them. He hated that he couldn't be out there helping them, but he knew his role was important too. He would be responsible for the aftermath.

Carl was angry that his father had refused him the chance to go out with them. Everyone else had been armed and sent out, even Michonne, and here he was arranging mattresses and listening to the ongoing blasts from outside. He could have done something. He was a better shot than Beth or Carol, but Rick had insisted that he stay inside and help Hershel.

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Daryl struggled to reload quickly. He didn't know what their side looked like, not allowing himself to glance at all into the prison yard, but the Governor's side was dwindling. He still hadn't seen the Governor himself, and he was especially waiting for that moment.

Finally, the Governor did appear, and Daryl saw his opportunity to fire at the man that had made their lives a bigger hell than they had to be, even in these times. He fired, but the crackling of gunfire down below echoed off as well. It would be difficult to know exactly which bullet had killed him, but Daryl was satisfied to see him crumple to the ground.

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When Daryl came out of the watchtower, he didn't know what he expected to see. At first he didn't see much of anything. The whole place was foggy from the gunfire. The first person he saw was Carol, crawling out from under the watchtower where she had taken cover.

"You hit?" Daryl asked.

"No, I'm fine."

"Where the hell is everybody?" Daryl said, looking out at the prison yard. There were a good number of hiding places, and apparently they were all being put to good use. Everyone was still a little nervous to show themselves.

"All over." Carol said.

"It's going to be like hide and seek if anybody's hit and can't come out." Daryl said. He and Carol split up, walking through the yard in different directions. Daryl wanted to know where Michonne was.

One by one, people started appearing from hiding places. All around him, Daryl could hear people yelling reports back and forth and scrambling around looking for the injured and helping them. He heard shots ring out and jumped before he realized it was Tyreese outside the gate, putting down any of people out there before they could turn. He still hadn't found Michonne and he was starting to get panicked.

Daryl ran into Brenda, one of the newer members of the group. She was kneeling beside Hank, one of the young men that had come from Woodbury.

"Help me." She said, pleading at Daryl. Daryl wanted to tell her that he didn't have time, but he walked over to her anyway. Daryl wasn't sure how to tell her that Hank couldn't be helped. He was clearly gut shot and the gurgling sounds that he was making made Daryl sure it was only a matter of moments before he died.

"Can't." Daryl said remorsefully.

"Daryl! Daryl! Come quick!" Carol yelled, running toward Daryl. He instinctively began to run after her. Carol led him to one of the old trucks in the yard where he found Michonne sitting with her back against it, her eyes closed and her shirt soaked in blood.

"Michonne!" He cried, dropping to his knees beside her. She turned her head toward him.

"I'm fine." She said weakly. "Just taking a breather."

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Hershel wasn't sure what he had expected. They had considered the possibility that some of them wouldn't make it and they had considered the possibility that some would be injured. He had been relieved when a sobbing Beth had fallen into his arms, and concerned when a blood smeared Maggie had slumped in minutes later. She wasn't hit, but Glenn was.

Hershel was working on Rick, who had been hit in the side, but who had still managed to bring himself into the prison, relieving Hershel of too much concern other than the loss of blood. That was a concern all around. They didn't exactly have a blood bank handy and even though Hershel didn't know what was happening in his waiting room, he could hear people trickling in every now again either bringing wounded, comforting wounded, or discussing what had happened. Hershel was feeling the strain, because even with Beth helping, he didn't know if he could patch everyone up quickly enough.

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Rick had been the first inside, and hadn't seen any of the others. Once he was bandaged, he stepped out, still holding his side with Hershel behind him to survey the damage.

Hershel had to survey the damage and figure out the order he would work on people. They were lucky in that aside from blood loss; most of the wounds he saw in front of him were relatively minor. The unwounded members of the group were doing the best they could to stop the bleeding.

The two worst injured were Glenn and Michonne. Glenn was hit in the side and in the leg, with Carol keeping pressure on the leg wound and Maggie putting pressure on his side. Michonne's wound was just below her left collarbone and Daryl was attempting to keep it from bleeding anymore than it already had. Hershel looked at both of them, ignoring the other more minor injuries in the room.

"Hershel…" Glenn said. "Ladies first."

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Daryl had thought he was having a heart attack when Michonne had suddenly gasped and gone limp while Hershel was digging the bullet out. Hershel had told him to calm down. She had only passed out and would wake up again soon.

Now Daryl was sitting in a chair that he'd drug into the cell, holding her hand and waiting. Hershel was optimistic. He kept coming in and checking on her, telling Daryl that her blood pressure had returned to normal and the only lasting effect she would suffer from this would be the need to get some rest, which probably wasn't a bad idea anyway.

In his mind, Daryl had scolded her about eighteen different ways. He had calculated all the different ways that the bullet, having been just a little one direction or the other, could have left him burying her today, just the same as Hank. He had forbidden her from every doing anything like this again, from ever scaring him as much as she had today. He had considered going out there and shooting the Governor a few more times…just for good measure…just to make him feel better.

At least they had won and the Governor was out of their way, and they had done better than Daryl had honestly expected. They had lost one, and five were injured, but the Governor's threats weren't hanging over their heads any longer.

When Michonne finally stirred a little, Daryl had jumped. She moaned a little.

"'Chonne?" Daryl said. He knew that people slapped others to get them to wake up, but he didn't have the heart to do that. "'Chonne? Open your eyes." He said.

Michonne opened her eyes and gently turned her head to the side, moaning again.

Daryl smiled at her and rubbed her face gently with the back of his hand. "You can't do that to me again." He said softly.


	20. Chapter 20

AN: Yes! The Governor is dead! And now we enter the realm of anything is possible. ;-)

I hope you enjoy!

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Daryl came into the cell with a bowl of water and put it on the table. Michonne looked at him.

"Carol said you might want a bath and it might make you feel better." Daryl said. "Thought you might rather have me help ya than her." He smiled.

"I can do it myself." Michonne said.

"Oh can you?" Daryl said with an evil grin. Michonne glared at him. He knew she hated to be challenged more than anything, but he liked to mess with her. Daryl knew that her glare was just because she was uncomfortable and annoyed having to lie in bed for the past two days. Daryl went and sat in the chair in the cell, looking at Michonne. "Well go ahead."

Michonne had not actually considered, until now, how she was going to get up on her own when the time came. She was stiff and her body ached. Hershel had fashioned a sling for her left arm, making her wear it in the bed so she wouldn't accidentally move it while she slept. She'd admitted to him that she really had little desire to move it right now. He'd also banished Daryl back to his perch so he wouldn't accidentally hurt her at night.

On top of her aching body, the little bit of a belly that she had wasn't going to help her in any way. She tried first to just sit straight up, but immediately knew that she wasn't going to be able to do that.

Daryl watched Michonne struggle for a second. He hated the pained look on her face, but her resistance almost made him laugh.

"Can I help you now?" He asked.

"I said I can _do it._" Michonne said.

"Boy, oh boy, do I got me a hard headed woman!" Daryl said, grinning. He watched her a few more minutes. He had to admit that she was being pretty creative in her technique, but it just wasn't _time_ yet. She needed to realize that she had just wait it out for a little while.

"Now?" He asked. She just glared at him and continued to try to sit up. "Oh, it's OK, take your time. As long as I'm with you I don't have to do nothin' else and you're the one who's gonna have to take a bath with cold water, so I ain't in no hurry." He said. Michonne stifled a laugh.

"Stop it!" She said. "Don't make me laugh. Are you _enjoying_ seeing me in pain?" She asked.

"Nah, 'Chonne, I don't enjoy that, but you do kinda look like a turtle that got turned over." He said. "Can I help you now or you want to keep on being bull headed?" Daryl responded, getting up.

Michonne sighed. "Fine." She said.

Daryl got up and helped her gently sit up. She wasn't wearing a shirt, and getting her out of her underwear was easy enough. When Daryl took her panties off, he grinned. He realized they were the same black lace panties that she'd been wearing the last time she got shot…the ones that had haunted him for a while.

"What are you grinning at?" Michonne asked as he got up and tossed them into the clothes pile.

"Nothin'." He said.

"You know," Michonne said, "I'm going to remember you were such a smart ass when you get hurt." She hated to admit it, but she was actually enjoying herself now that Daryl was gently sponging her off.

"I don't get hurt, 'Chonne. I ain't no delicate flower like you." Daryl said. He leaned her around a bit to catch her facial expression. She knew he was just trying to get a reaction from her, so she simply gave him the slightly annoyed face that she knew he wanted, even though she wasn't really annoyed.

"You seem happy that I'm hurt." She said.

"Nah, I ain't happy you're hurt, but I am happy." Daryl said. "We got that damn Governor." He stopped what he was doing for a moment to kiss her, and she smiled at him. Daryl _was_ happy, and he wore that happiness very openly for the moment.

Daryl was very happy. The Governor was dead. He hated that Michonne was injured, but Hershel had said she be perfectly fine and now she was safe. He felt like they were all a lot safer. Everything seemed fine with the baby and the weather was warming up. Daryl was happy indeed.

Michonne was happy that Governor was dead, but the battle still chewed at her a little. She wondered if she'd actually been help out there at all. When they had run in their various directions, she'd immediately run for the car. It was about halfway through the yard and she'd already decided it would be a good place for her to maybe have a chance of hitting someone, maybe even the Governor. Unfortunately, she hadn't counted on the fact that she couldn't run as fast as she used to and she'd been hit in the first round of fire, forcing herself to crawl the rest of the way to the truck for cover. She'd fired after that, but she was pretty sure she hadn't hit anything since after crawling on it; she couldn't stand to use her left arm. She felt like she had let them down. She hadn't been able to really help anyone.

"Besides, I kinda like takin' care of ya." Daryl said, snapping Michonne out of her thoughts. "It's good practice."

"Practice for what?" Michonne said.

"Practice for washin' the baby." Daryl said. He grabbed a towel to start drying off whatever water hadn't been dried off by the air.

"Washing a baby is a lot different than washing me." Michonne said.

"Yeah…the baby's more cooperative and whines less." Daryl said.

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"What exactly are we watchin' for?" Daryl asked, leaning back against the watchtower wall. He had stolen a tennis ball from Maggie and Glenn's "toy box" and was bouncing it on the floor. He realized it was probably irritating Rick, but he was enjoying bouncing the ball. "The Governor's dead, you know." He added.

"Walkers." Rick said. He was sitting in one of the chairs, just staring out at the yard. Looking worried was common in the prison, but right now no one looked worried, except for Rick.

"Found 'em." Daryl said. "Three of 'em and it looks like it's chow time at the O.K. Corral." He said. The Walkers rambling outside the fence were dining on the Governor and his men. They had considered bringing the bodies inside the fence and burning them, but in the end they had decided just to leave them there because it was too much effort and they didn't even deserve the decency of being burned. "We gave 'em a nice little treat…it's like Thanksgiving for Walkers."

Rick just grunted at him and continued to stare at the yard.

"Rick, man, what are you worryin' about? For once we ain't got nothin' to worry about!" Daryl said. He stopped bouncing the ball.

"We can't stay here forever." Rick said. "The Governor is gone, but there could be more like him. Plus we are going to need supplies and we've cleaned out most of the closest little towns. We'll have to go farther out."

"So we go farther out." Daryl said.

"We don't have the gas to keep doing that for long, Daryl, and we aren't exactly finding tons more of it everywhere we go. We're going to have to move on." Rick said. Daryl thought for a few minutes.

"Look, Rick, we can't move on right now. We got four people injured bad enough they couldn't fight for themselves. Glenn can't even walk right now and Michonne can barely move, less likely fight off Walkers." Daryl said. "And I ain't havin' her givin' birth in the middle of the woods like some kinda animal. She don't deserve to do that." Daryl added.

Rick could hear that Daryl was getting irritated. He was starting to admit to himself that maybe he'd been a little less than fair to Michonne in the past. She had surprised him that night when she declared that she was going to fight with the group, even though she was pregnant. She had surprised him even more when the fight broke out and she had run past him, toward the fence, into range. He couldn't imagine Lori doing that. He couldn't imagine himself _letting_ Lori do that. That was the thing about Michonne. Daryl loved her, but he couldn't control her. That was what worried Rick most about her. She couldn't be controlled… _wouldn't_ be controlled, and he worried about what that kind of attitude could cause in a group like this.

"Calm down, Daryl, I wasn't saying we need to leave tonight. We'll wait until after the baby's born." Rick said. "I'm just concerned that Hershel said we've got at least four months until that baby is born. It'll be hot then, but it won't be too long before it starts to get cold. I'm just trying to figure out how _long_ we wait."

Daryl did calm down a little. "I don't know, Rick, but we don't leave until Hershel says Michonne can travel. I know enough about havin' babies that I don't think she'd be up for walkin' a couple thousand miles the next day."

Rick snickered at him. "Well, we'd take the car, of course."

"Still…" Daryl said.

"Don't worry, Daryl." Rick said. "I'll talk to you about it before I talk to anyone else in the group, and we'll talk to Hershel."

Daryl was satisfied with that, but he had to admit to himself that he didn't really like the idea of leaving the prison. He understood what Rick was saying, and it was true that runs would get farther and farther out and take more and more time and gas, but it seemed kind of sad. Things felt kind of safe right now, a whole lot safe than they had in a while, and the prison had become a home to their "family." Daryl didn't want to really go anywhere. He just wanted to stay there and know that his family, all of it, was safe.


	21. Chapter 21

"I'm doing laundry today. It's a beautiful day. I thought maybe you'd like to come out and sit with me. Get a little sun and some fresh air." Carol said, coming into Michonne's cell. "We also have a very important football tournament going on."

It had been a few days since the battle and Michonne did feel like a little fresh air would be nice. She accepted Carol's help getting up and followed her outside. After being in the cell for so many days, the sun was almost blinding. Around the washtub area, Carol had set up chairs. Hershel and Glenn were also sitting out there. Nearly everyone else was in the yard playing football.

"It lives!" Glenn shouted at Michonne as she joined them, sitting in the empty chair. Carol put pillow behind Michonne's back and she thanked her. "Hey! I didn't get a pillow." Glenn said.

"Grow me a baby and I'll get you a pillow." Carol said, taking her seat by the washtubs and continuing to wash them.

"Oh, well, I guy can dream." Glenn said. "Who's winning?"

"I think that Tyreese's team is winning right now." Hershel said.

Michonne thought it was strange. A few days ago they had all run out into this very same yard not knowing if they'd live or die. Now everyone was playing football and enjoying idle chit chat.

"It's nice having y'all out here with me." Carol said. "Normally it's just Hershel that keeps me company."

"Us getting wounded was a Carol conspiracy the whole time." Glenn said. "Just one question, Carol, why did you have to go and shoot me twice?"

Carol smiled. "Because you're my favorite and I wanted to give you double the love."

"We've underestimated Carol all this time." Hershel said. "We never knew she was capable of such a master plan."

"Don't say that around Rick." Carol said. "Let's keep my diabolical nature to ourselves."

"Where is Rick?" Michonne asked. He was the only person not in the yard.

"You know Rick, he's in the watchtower. He said his side hurt, but I think there's something more than that. He wouldn't talk to me about it, though, I'm just the one who washes his underwear, not a problem solver." Carol said.

"You don't actually think that, do you?" Michonne said.

"I think that Rick thinks that." Carol replied.

"Rick worries a lot. That's how he got through this so far, so I think he thinks he can't stop worrying or he won't make it any farther." Hershel said.

"Well, he needs to stop worrying for at least a little while. I mean doesn't it just feel different?" Glenn said. "It feels good. Don't you just feel like you can…I don't know…breathe?"

"Not very deeply." Michonne said. Glenn cocked his head to the side and looked at her.

"Was that _humor_?" He asked. Michonne giggled at him.

"Whoa!" He said. "Don't look now, but I think Michonne has a sense of humor!"

Michonne didn't respond, but she did smile at him. Glenn was a good kid. He'd been nice to her since she got there. He was nice to everyone. Michonne looked around. The football game was in some kind of break because everyone was huddled up. On the ground not far from her, Carol had put down a blanket and Judith was trying to crawl on it.

"She hasn't quite got the hang of it." Michonne said.

"I know. She's been doing that all morning. She knows how to get up, but she doesn't know what to do once she's up, she just rocks back and forth until she falls down again." Carol said. "One of these days we'll have another little one out there trying to crawl."

Michonne hadn't let herself get that far. She felt the baby a lot now, squirming around and doing what she thought were summersaults, but she hadn't actually let herself believe entirely that it was real, and that one day it would be doing things like crawling.

"Who's winning now?" Glenn asked.

"Now it looks like Daryl's team is winning, but not by much." Hershel said.

"He shouldn't have picked Beth. I don't think she knows what she's doing, no offense, Hershel." Glenn said.

"None taken. I don't think Beth knows how to play football. She never learned. Maggie loves it, though." Hershel said.

"That's why Daryl picked Beth." Carol said. "Daryl picked Beth because she was so excited about _learning_ how to play. He didn't want her to get picked last and maybe hurt that excitement."

Michonne nodded. That was Daryl. He didn't like for people to get their feelings hurt, not if there was anything that he could do about it. That had been his only regret since they got together. He hated that Carol had gotten her feelings hurt. Though she wouldn't change her relationship for anything in the world, Michonne also hated that Carol had gotten her feelings hurt.

"But the stakes are high and she's not delivering…they could lose because Tyreese knows that Beth is new to this and he's playing that up." Glenn said.

"Why are the stakes high?" Michonne asked. _What were the stakes? They didn't have anything anymore and whatever they did have, they all shared._

Carol laughed a little. "On one of the runs Maggie and Glenn took, they brought back some snack pack pudding. I told them the winning team of the best out of six games gets pudding for dessert tonight."

Michonne snickered. These days pudding was worth playing as well as you could, that was sure.

"Don't worry," Carol added, "Washer women, one legged old men, pregnant women, and injured Korean boys _always_ get pudding."

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"'Tis a good night indeed!" Maggie said, eating her pudding especially slow and making faces at Sasha while she did it. Despite the weaknesses that Beth's lack of knowledge brought, their team had won and Maggie was more excited about the pudding than she'd been about anything in weeks.

"That's alright," Sasha responded. "Next time we are going to skunk you."

They were sitting around the living room; the victors and the ones who couldn't play were enjoying their desserts and chatting. Daryl didn't like pudding very much, so he'd given his to Michonne, who had seemed almost as excited as Maggie about the prospect of pudding. He had handed to her, telling her she got two because she needed enough to share with the baby. That had won him a big smile, so he was really quite glad right now that he didn't like pudding.

Daryl was sharing his mattress with Josh, who he hadn't talked to much before, but who looked very down. Daryl wasn't sure if it was because he'd been shot in the arm and was upset about that, or if it had been the loss of the guy from Woodbury.

"You don't like pudding either?" Daryl asked. Josh's was unopened on the floor next to him.

"I'm not in the mood to celebrate." Josh said, solemnly.

Daryl looked at him. The boy was young. He was only maybe 20.

"Wanna talk about it?" Daryl asked.

"Hank was my big brother." Josh said. He didn't need to say anymore than that.

"Hey, I'm sorry…I had a big brother too, man." Daryl said. Josh had nodded his head, understanding that Daryl was trying to comfort him.

That had become the way of comforting someone these days…the acknowledgement that you had been there too. It brought about the realization that they had all been there and they had all suffered losses, and were likely to suffer more. Even though right now they were all excited about victory pudding and the winning of one fight, it didn't mean that they hadn't had so many dark times before.

"So, is Brenda your girl?" Daryl asked, trying to get the boy's mind on anything else.

"Yeah, I guess so." Josh said. "Is the pregnant black chick your wife?" He asked.

"Her name is Michonne." Daryl said. "And we're not married." He added. They weren't married. What was he supposed to call her? He didn't think of her as his girl, and he didn't think of her as his wife. Lately she'd become pretty much everything to him. She was just _his_.

"That your baby?" Josh asked. Daryl snickered.

"Yeah. I reckon I'd know around here if it weren't." Daryl said.

"Aren't you worried about it? I mean that it might get eaten by Walkers or something?" Josh said.

Daryl didn't really know how to respond. In all his daydreaming about the baby, that had never happened. He hadn't wanted to think about it, so he just hadn't. Now it was making him uncomfortable. Things did happen, he knew that much, but he didn't want to really think about them. He'd rather just take it one day at a time. He forgave the boy, however, for bringing it up, realizing that the kid meant no harm but was just in a dark place right now.

"Nah, its mom's the last samurai." Daryl said. "Walkers ain't gettin' the kid."

Despite the lighthearted nature of his reply, Josh could see that he had kind of bothered Daryl. He was sorry for that. Right now he didn't feel like anything was sacred in the world. His brother had been his best friend for as long as he could remember. Sure, they'd fought together, but that was just kid stuff. When this thing had started, when the shit really hit the fan, his brother had been the one who had held his act together and made sure they were safe. He hadn't meant to imply that Daryl's baby would get eaten by Walkers, but he didn't have a very bright outlook for the future at this point.

"Hey, I'm sorry." Josh said.

"Don't worry about it." Daryl said.

"What was your…um…what was her name again?" Josh asked.

"Michonne." Daryl responded.

"Give her my pudding." Josh said handing it to Daryl. "She looks like she really likes it."


	22. Chapter 22

AN: I have other chapters written. However, my computer broke down so I'm having to upload them when I get to the office. This means that my updates may not be as frequent as I would like until the computer is replaced. (Soon, I hope.) Don't worry; I am not leaving you with any kind of cliffhangers, just less frequent updates until further notice.

I'm so glad to see that some of you are still excited. We've got quite the journey ahead of us. :-)

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Michonne and Daryl came into the kitchen to find Maggie, Carol, and Hershel sitting around the table. Carol was writing on a piece of paper.

"What'cha doin'" Daryl asked, sliding out a chair for Michonne to sit in it and then sitting behind her on a stool.

"Making a list." Carol said. "Maggie is going stir crazy so she's going on a run."

"Alone?" Daryl asked.

"I think Beth is going with me." Maggie said.

Daryl snickered. "Might as well go alone."

"Be nice, Daryl." Carol said.

"What? I ain't tryin' to be mean, but everyone knows Beth can't fight Walkers. Even Beth knows that." He said. "Where you goin'?" He asked Maggie.

"I thought we'd go a little beyond that last town we found. Maybe we can find another that hasn't been picked over. We're going to get food, clean out whatever we can get at a pharmacy, and we're going to get baby things!" Maggie squealed.

Carol looked up. "Baby's gonna need a crib, and Maggie's going to get some more cloth diapers and some more clothes. Judith is outgrowing what we have for her and I figured we should get boy and girl clothes so the baby could have a few things of its own. Michonne is going to want to nest soon and I thought she should have a few things to do it with."

"What the hell? Michonne's gonna build a nest?" Daryl asked. Carol and Michonne laughed at him.

"Nesting is what they call it, but you're not actually building a nest. I don't know, it's strange. You just sort of get the urge to get things ready." Carol said. "Any special requests, Michonne?"

_Special requests_…Michonne thought. If Hershel was right, and the little calendar he had created on the wall was correct, then Michonne was easily twenty seven weeks pregnant. As much as she kept trying to put it out of her mind, this was actually a reality. It looked like she was really going to have a baby, and now Carol wanted to know if she had any special requests. For a second it struck Michonne. This was the first time that she was really letting herself believe that she would become a mother again soon. Everybody else believed it, but she had to admit that she hadn't entirely until now.

"Michonne, are you OK?" Maggie asked. Her face wore a look of concerned and Michonne realized she hadn't answered and she wasn't exactly sure what kind of face she was making.

"I'm fine." Michonne said. "Uh…I don't know, Carol. I can't think of anything beyond the basics."

"Oh we'll get all kinds of things." Maggie said, clapping her hands together excitedly.

"I'll go with you." Daryl said. "I ain't lettin' just you and Beth go out there. You don't know how many Walkers you'll run into. We don't got the Governor collectin' 'em up no more and I've seen at least two herds move through the area.

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As they pulled out of the prison, Daryl wasn't really sure about this little excursion. Sasha had joined them at the last minute and all three of the _girls_ in the car with him had just transformed into the chattiest, giggliest group that he'd ever been around.

"I think we should sing." Maggie said. She had her feet up on the dash in front of her.

"Man, no singing." Daryl said.

"Come on, Daryl, loosen up." Maggie said. "What's your favorite song?"

"I am loose, and I don't sing." Daryl said.

"We could play a game or something." Beth offered from the back seat.

"We used to play the alphabet game on car rides, but I don't think we'd get far with that." Sasha said.

"I spy wouldn't work either." Beth said.

"I don't know any other car games." Maggie said.

"I know one that I like." Daryl said.

"Really, what?" Maggie sounded surprised that Daryl was going to cooperate on the fun outing she had planned.

"It's called the quiet game and I bet I can beat you." Daryl said, smiling.

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Daryl was tired of babysitting. They'd had a productive run so far, obtaining both food and cleaning out the pharmacy for the most part. This town had been picked over pretty good, so it wasn't as big of a score as the last one had been, and there had been quite a few Walkers. Luckily Maggie and Sasha weren't too bad at fighting Walkers and between them and Daryl they had been able to manage.

Now they were on their last stop, the baby section at a store they had found. The girls were in heaven. Daryl didn't even know what half of the stuff they were putting in bags was. He was just walking around looking at everything. There was so much stuff for babies. He couldn't imagine what you needed all this stuff for.

Daryl came across something that looked interesting to him. It had a picture of a woman who was wearing a baby wrapped around her in a big cloth or something. He picked it up and looked at it. It looked like the baby was tied to her and she had both of her arms free. He thought Michonne might like that, thinking ahead to when they moved on. He was the only one right now that new they were moving on. He'd convinced Rick not to talk about it with anyone yet. Everyone was so happy right now. They deserved to enjoy that happiness as long as they could. No one would want to think about all the dangers that moving on would bring.

Daryl took a few more of the things that he had found. Maybe whoever was responsible for Lil' Asskicker when they moved on would want one too.

"Ya'll 'bout ready?" Daryl asked as he joined the girls and dropped his findings in the bag that Beth was holding.

"Yeah, we got a lot of great stuff!" Maggie said. "I can't wait to show it all to Michonne."

Daryl smiled at her. "I'm sure she's itchin' to see what you picked out." He said. On the way to the car they killed about eight more Walkers. "Suckers are startin' to get plentiful again." Daryl said.

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When they got back, Maggie had been about to burst to get to this "baby shower" that they'd talked about nonstop in the car. Daryl offered to unload the rest of the stuff while the girls went in and had their fun. He didn't have any interest in watching them go through the bags of stuff they'd gotten, and he'd heard more than enough about it. They had thanked him, taking the crib and the baby things and leaving him to get the rest out.

"Need help?" Rick asked, coming up behind him and grabbing a couple of the bags out of the back.

"Yeah. I told them I would do it. I couldn't take anymore squealing." Daryl said. "We got a lot of food, but the pharmacy was more picked over than we had hoped. I think they got all the baby stuff they wanted."

"At the end of the world that aren't that many people planning families." Rick said.

"Nah, I guess not, but it happens." Daryl said. Rick nodded. They went back to unloading, carrying everything inside so that Hershel and Carol could sort it later.

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"Oh my gosh! Look how cute!" Rachel said, cooing over some of the outfits that she was pulling out of bags.

Michonne was dizzied by all the stuff that they were pulling out, everyone trying to show her something different at the same time. She had been slowly dealing with the realization that there _would be_ a baby, and this was overwhelming.

"It feels like we should have games." Carol said. "When I was pregnant with Sophia there were all kinds of games at the baby shower."

"What kinds of games?" Glenn asked. "We have Monopoly, and Connect Four." He offered.

"No, Glenn, baby games." Carol said. "Like, I don't know, you each get 20 clothespins, and every time you say the word 'baby' whoever notices it gets your clothespin until one person has them all."

"Wow, that sounds great." Glenn said sarcastically.

"Son, there are things that really excite women. When it comes to those things, you just leave them alone to do what they're going to do. Getting ready for babies is one of those things." Hershel said.

Daryl came in the room with Rick behind him. He walked over to Michonne, kissed her quickly, and rubbed her belly. He didn't miss the "Oooh" and "Awww" that he got from the three musketeers that had been giving him a hard time all day. He sat down on the mattress with Carol, since it was the one closest to Michonne's chair.

"Sure is a lotta stuff." He said.

"Babies need a lot of stuff." Maggie said. "Besides, it wasn't expensive. They were practically giving it away." Daryl laughed at her.

"Ok, I haven't done it yet, but it's baby shower tradition…" Carol started. "Can I feel the baby?"

Michonne realized that besides Daryl and Hershel, no one had touched her belly. It hadn't been that way with her girls. Everyone had touched her belly, even though it bothered her sometimes when strangers even felt the right to do it. She'd never understood why, but a pregnant belly seemed to be a magnet to people. Everyone here looked at it a lot, but no one had actually touched her. In fact, the look on Carol's face right now, one of hope but a little nervousness, made her wonder if they had been afraid to touch her.

Michonne smiled at Carol, more to reassure her than anything. "Come here." She said. She pushed around until she felt the baby start to kick and then put Carol's hand over it. Carol lingered there a minute and then she looked at Michonne and smiled. Michonne knew that for a moment she was thinking about Sophia, about when she'd been pregnant. Michonne knew that Carol thought about that a lot because she talked about it a lot. Michonne didn't talk about it, but she still felt it.

Once the ice was broken, everyone wanted to feel it, and Michonne obliged them as long as the baby cooperated. Glenn had been the most fascinated. When Carol helped him back to his chair he was still sitting there, his forehead a little wrinkled.

"You keep poking at it." He said. "Why?" Before Michonne could respond, Maggie poked Glenn. "Hey!" She poked him again. "Stop!" He said irritated. Maggie poked him again, this time laughing. "Stop poking me!" Glenn said, swatting at her.

"That's why." Maggie said, laughing. "Makes the baby move."

"Point taken." Glenn said.

"So are you nervous about having it?" Rachel asked.

Michonne _was_ nervous about the birth, but she wasn't sure that she wanted to admit it to everyone. She might have admitted it to Daryl, or she might have admitted it to Carol, but she didn't really want to say it to everyone.

"Maybe a little." She said. She hadn't lied completely.

"Maybe it won't be too bad." Maggie offered.

"Well, I'm afraid I can't offer you the, what did you call it? The good drugs." Hershel said. "I'm afraid this time you'll have to fly solo."

Instantly Michonne saw the look cross everyone's face except Carol's. The worst part of it all was that Daryl was looking at her now too, and it wasn't a look that she could read very clearly. It was a look of sadness, but also of disappointment.

"Well…" Carol said, trying to break the awkward silence and change the topic. "We better get all this cleaned up. Michonne, did you want the crib in your cell or did you want me to put it in Judith's cell?"

"Um…my cell, I guess." Michonne responded. She hadn't thought about it, and she couldn't think about it right now.

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"Why didn't you tell me you had a baby before, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked. Michonne was sitting on the bed with her back against the wall and Daryl was sitting in front of her, looking hurt.

"I don't know, Daryl. I just didn't want to talk about it, and it doesn't really matter." She said.

"It _does_ matter." Daryl said. He couldn't explain why it mattered. He had figured that Michonne had a life before this, and he'd thought she'd maybe had a husband or a boyfriend. It wasn't like it bothered him that he wasn't her first guy or nothing, he'd figured that out pretty quickly, but it felt like he didn't know her, and that hurt him. He hadn't known she had a child. That felt like a big thing not to know about someone.

"I had two." Michonne said. She didn't want to talk about it, but the look on his face was so sad, and it contrasted so much with the look that he'd worn lately.

Daryl looked up at her. "What were their names?" He asked.

Michonne sighed. "Angelica and Celine. Angelica was named after my grandmother, and Celine was named after my husband's mother."

"So you had two little girls?" Daryl asked. He tried to picture what they might have looked like. Michonne just nodded. Daryl wanted to know what had happened to them. He knew, though, that it was not going to be a happy story. "'Chonne…" He said after a minute. "What happened?"

Immediately the look that crossed Michonne's face made Daryl wish he hadn't asked it. She was breathing hard. He reached over and took her hand in his, trying to offer some type of comfort.

"Angelica was three and Celine was four." Michonne said. "We hadn't planned for them to be so close together. I had a hard time getting pregnant with Angelica, and I guess once I had her it wasn't hard anymore. My husband couldn't really handle it, so the marriage broke apart. When this whole thing started they were with him for the weekend and I had gone to the office to take care of a few things. When I realized all this crazy stuff was happening, I went home. I found my boyfriend there with his best friend and both of them had turned. I had to put them both down, and all I could get my hands on was a kitchen knife. After that, I realized how bad it was and drove to my ex-husband's house to get my girls, but when I got there…" Michonne stopped talking. She was crying and she was crying hard now. Daryl slipped beside her and hugged her to him. She wailed into his chest, and he hugged her harder, letting her cry it out.

"You don't gotta say nothin' else." He said. "You don't gotta."

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The wailing cries echoed through the prison. Everyone that was still in the living room playing games and talking froze. Glenn cast a slightly frightened look at Carol, and Maggie looked confused.

Carol understood those sounds, and it hurt her heart. She didn't know Michonne's story, but she knew when Daryl had asked her to go back to the cell with him that he was going to ask her about it. Carol knew that those tears were the worst ones that a mother could cry. She felt bad that the prison echoed the way it did and that everyone in the living room had heard them. Those tears were private, but there was no such thing as privacy anymore.

"Go back to your game." She said to Glenn and Maggie. "Just let it be."


	23. Chapter 23

AN: Well, as it turns out my crisis with technology has been solved. It took less time than I thought it would, so I'm glad of that.

I now bring you your regularly scheduled program.

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"I wish you was marryin' me." Daryl said. He was spooning Michonne, rubbing her belly and kissing her back at intervals. She was already drifting off to sleep, but hadn't gone entirely. Hershel was finally going to marry Glenn and Maggie the next day and that had been pretty much all the prison had talked about all day.

"Are you asking me to marry you?" Michonne asked.

"I ain't got no ring…and my luck if I got one from a Walker like Glenn it wouldn't fit." Daryl said. Michonne responded by shifting backwards and snuggling into him.

"I don't need a ring, Daryl." Michonne mumbled. She pressed his hand to her belly. "I think we pretty much have enough right here."

"So you'd marry me?" Daryl asked.

"I'll talk to Hershel tomorrow." Michonne said. Daryl was quiet a few minutes.

"'Chonne, what is your last name?" He asked after a few minutes.

"Don't have one." She mumbled back. It didn't matter anyway and she'd never been fond of her last name after she and her husband divorced. She had always thought she'd get it changed back to her maiden name, but she'd never legally done that. These days no one needed last names.

"Everybody's got a last name, 'Chonne. You ain't Cher." Daryl said.

"Does it matter, Daryl?" Michonne asked.

Daryl responded by kissing her back again. "Baby's gotta have a last name." He said.

"I guess it's Dixon, then." Michonne said. Daryl was quiet again. "Can we go to sleep now?" She added.

"Night, 'Chonne." Daryl said.

"Goodnight, Daryl." Michonne said.

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"Maggie, can I talk to you?" Michonne asked the next morning, finding Maggie in the courtyard talking to Beth.

"Sure." Maggie said. Beth took the cue and went to find Carol to see about helping with the special dinner they were planning.

"I wanted to find out how you'd feel about Daryl and me getting married today too. We would ask Hershel to do it privately, just something quiet. I wouldn't want to distract from you getting married." Michonne said. To her surprise Maggie threw her arms around her.

"You mean like a double wedding? That would be so great!" Maggie said.

"Well, I wasn't thinking about it that way." Michonne said when they split apart.

"No, I love it! We'll get married together. It'll be a big day for weddings around here. I'm so excited! I have to go tell Glenn." Before Michonne could say anything, Maggie went trotting off.

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"Well I hope you were serious about us getting married." Michonne said when she found Daryl twisting wire around one of the patches that was weakened.

"Course I was serious." Daryl said without stopping what he was doing.

"Well, Maggie is thrilled. She wants us to get married together. A double wedding kind of thing." Michonne said.

"You mean like a wedding, wedding?" Daryl asked. He hadn't really thought about all that. Which it wasn't like Maggie and Glenn were going to really have any kind of a special wedding. They didn't have dressy clothes or anything, they were just getting married in front of everyone and Carol and Rachel were making some kind of big meal for everyone. "I guess it don't matter." He added after a moment.

Michonne wasn't sure why she felt nervous, but she did. They were getting married, but it wasn't like anything would change. The only thing that would change is she would be able to call Daryl her husband, but that was basically what he was anyway. At least that was how she had come to think of him. He was just _there._ She knew that every night he was going to be in her bed, their bed…these days there wasn't anything legal about anything, so wasn't that really all being married was going to boil down to?

Daryl liked the idea of getting married, and it surprised him how much he liked it. Michonne hadn't said anything, she'd just turned to head back to the prison and he'd continued twisting the wire, trying to make sure that no Walkers got through to come to the ceremony. Daryl was getting married today…Michonne would be his wife. He'd finally know what to call her when people asked him…all the new people that they might meet one day. Now he'd be able to say she was his _wife_.

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"I always cry at weddings." Rachel admitted to Carol. They were in the yard and waiting for everyone to get settled.

"Really? I never cry at weddings. I never really understood why anyone cries at weddings." Carol said.

"It's just so emotional. I mean you realize that the two people that are in front of you _really _love each other." Rachel said.

That wasn't always the case at weddings, Carol thought. It hadn't been the case at her wedding. She had loved him, but it hadn't taken her very long to figure out that once they were married he didn't love her. At least that wasn't the case with the people who were getting married today. Maggie had announced to everyone that Daryl and Michonne were going to get married with her and Glenn. Carol thought it was a nice idea. She had no doubt that Glenn and Maggie loved each other, and she also had no doubt that Michonne and Daryl were very much in love. You could always see _real love_, it was always written all over their faces.

Hershel performed the ceremony and everyone had clapped when the two couples kissed. It really hadn't seemed like much of anything. Just the "public" declaration of what everyone already knew, but at least it was as official as anything ever got these days.

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Michonne was pretty sure this was the strangest conversation that she'd ever had with anyone. She was lying on her back on the bed, and Daryl was standing over her.

The conversation had begun essentially because, just as they were going to bed, Rachel had started teasing them about the prison being up all night because they had marriages that they better "get to consumatin'".

Daryl had been put off by the comments, and the teasing that followed from the others.

"They're gonna hear us." Had been his first concern.

"They already hear us." Michonne had countered.

"Yeah, but now they're gonna be listenin'" Daryl had said.

As the conversation had progressed from there, Michonne had finally talked Daryl out of that line of worrying. Then he had entered into another line.

They hadn't had sex since she'd been injured. For obvious reasons that had been off the table for a while. Michonne wasn't really sure why, but they hadn't decided exactly how long to wait. Neither of them had been driven crazy with the need…the only thing that had driven them crazy was the period of time when Daryl wasn't allowed to sleep in the cell with her, but once he'd been allowed back in they had been perfectly content just to sleep together. So Daryl's next concern was that it might still hurt her if she got jarred.

"I'm fine and I feel fine. I'll let you know if it hurts." She had assured him.

Once they had solved that problem, then had come the logistics of _how_…what would be the most comfortable option for them both. That had taken them a few minutes to sort out, but they'd finally gotten through it. Now Daryl was concerned about something else.

"What about the baby?" He asked.

"What about it?" Michonne said. She put her hands behind her head. At this point she was not even in the mood anymore, though she had been at various intervals during the conversation.

"Well, I mean, what if…I don't know…what if it like shakes loose or something?" Daryl asked.

Michonne laughed. "Daryl, we've had sex since I got pregnant and it didn't shake the baby loose. It'll be fine. Pregnant women can have sex." Michonne said.

"Yeah, but you weren't as pregnant then." Daryl said.

Michonne laughed again. "You know what this is turning into? It's making me feel like I'm on vacation in Daryl Land." Daryl just looked at her.

"Daryl Land?" He asked after a minute.

"Yes, this little trip inside your head is like being at an amusement park, except no one is being amused." Michonne said.

"Don't be a smart ass. I can't help it if I get worried about that stuff. I don't want nothin' happenin' to the baby." Daryl said.

"Daryl, the baby will be fine, I promise." Hershel called out from his cell. Michonne laughed.

"Damn it, 'Chonne! See, they're listenin'!" Daryl said.

"We're not listening, Daryl. We're all asleep. It's OK. Go ahead." Carol called out. Michonne laughed again. Daryl's face was priceless.

"Come on, Daryl, come to bed. We'll try again later." Michonne said. It was more than obvious that it wasn't happening tonight, since it didn't seem like either of them was in the mood, or likely to be in the mood any time soon.

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"Daryl, the key to it is that you don't think about it as much." Glenn said over breakfast.

"I reckon you're going to give me advice now? Do you want to discuss technique with me too?" Daryl snapped back.

"What he's sayin' is true." Josh said. "I mean if you think about it, it ain't gonna happen. You can't let it get to you that everyone can hear everything, you just gotta think about the task at hand."

"Damn it, shut up! I ain't talkin' 'bout this with some kid who can't even shave." Daryl said.

"Calm down, Daryl. They're just teasing you. No one is questioning your manhood. I, for one, have heard enough octaves of Michonne's voice to know you have no problem in that area when your mind is on it." Carol said. "Besides, from what I heard this morning you redeemed yourself nicely.

Daryl blushed and Michonne reached over and put her hand on top of his.

"I've got no complaints." She said. She leaned over and he kissed her.

"I'm glad you're married." Carol said. "Or I wouldn't stand for that kind of behavior at the breakfast table."


	24. Chapter 24

The best word that anyone could have used to describe everyone was fidgety. Michonne was fidgety because the baby would be coming any time now and she was uncomfortable almost all of the time. Nearly everyone else was fidgety because Michonne was fidgety.

Michonne felt like everyone watched her constantly. There were always eyes on her at all times. It was a little annoying to feel like people were staring at you nonstop, waiting for you to _do _something.

"Uncomfortable?" Carol asked Michonne. They were sitting at the table sorting through canned goods to figure out what would be for dinner. Michonne was constantly shifting in her chair and sighing.

"Yeah." Michonne said.

"It'll be soon." Carol said.

"I know." Michonne replied. She didn't know if that was a good thing or a bad thing. Part of her thought that soon sounded great because she was hot all the time, nearly always sweating, she could never get comfortable, and she hadn't slept well for a while. The other part of her, the part that was dreading the transition process between being pregnant and not being pregnant, did not like the sound of soon.

"Hershel asked me to be in there in case he needed any help. If you don't want me to be there, though, I can tell him just to get me if there's any complications." Carol said. "Which there won't be." She added.

"No, I actually do want you to be in there." Michonne said. She couldn't really explain it, but there was something about Carol that was calming, and she thought that calm might be a good thing. She wasn't sure how Daryl was going to handle the situation and she might need someone like Carol to help her out with things.

"Then I'll be there." Carol said.

They continued sorting cans in silence for a while. Then Maggie and Beth scuttled past the kitchen door dragging a mattress.

"That's the third time, I think…" Carol said. "I think Maggie and Beth are up to something."

"I think you're right." Michonne said. Maggie was pretty notorious in the prison for some of her antics. She had more than enough energy for two or three people and she had too much creativity for her own good sometimes. Beth was the perfect toady for Maggie since she went right along with anything her sister told her to do, never questioning if it was a good idea or a bad idea.

"Feel up to checking it out?" Carol asked.

Michonne was tired of the monotony of _Peas…carrots…corn…peas…corn…lima beans…_ running through her mind, so she was curious to see what the two of them were doing with the stash of mattresses that they were so busy hauling around.

"Yeah." She said. Carol got up and came around, taking Michonne's hand and helping her heave up to her feet. It had been a while since Michonne had been able to stand up unassisted, and everyone had pretty much accepted that the person closest to her should be ready to pull her up whenever the need arose.

The started down the hall, following what looked like snail trails on the floor.

"This floor is filthy." Carol said.

"Yeah, it's pretty bad." Michonne said. She'd never thought about how dirty the prison was, but the contrast of the snail trail made it pretty obvious.

As the trail ended, they found themselves outside one of the unused cells. Maggie and Beth were in the process of heaving this mattress on top of the stack of mattresses that they already had in front of them. They had taken all the other things out of the cell, except for the nightstand.

"What are you doing?" Carol asked.

"We're building a birthing pen for Michonne." Beth said, panting as they slid the mattress into place. "We used to do it on the farm all the time."

"Birthing _cell_, Beth. She's not livestock." Maggie corrected. "I just thought she might like to have a comfortable place to have the baby. We could bring in some stuff to make it more comfortable or something."

"That's nice of you." Michonne said. She hadn't actually thought of that yet. She didn't know where she was going to have the baby, but the stack of mattresses did look a little more inviting than the idea of Hershel's table.

"No problem. We needed something to do anyway." Maggie said.

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"What you pacin' for?" Daryl asked. He was lying in bed and Michonne was pacing around the cell.

"I don't know. It feels good." Michonne said. When she lied down or sat she was uncomfortable. When she stood up she was uncomfortable. She didn't really know why shuffling back and forth around the cell was more comfortable, but it was right now.

"What we gon name the baby?" Daryl asked. They hadn't talked about names.

"Whatever you want." Michonne said. She hadn't really thought about naming the baby, but it would have to have a name. When her girls were born it had been pretty easy to name them. She'd picked one name and her husband had picked the other. Michonne was open to pretty much anything, but she didn't really feel like trying to think about the name.

"Do you think it's a girl or a boy?" Daryl asked.

"Could be either." Michonne responded. She hadn't really thought about that either. It was just "baby" around the prison. No one had really talked about it like it would have a gender. It was just some genderless being that was with them but wasn't with them. It was someone they all talked about constantly, but couldn't see.

"Well I know that, 'Chonne, but what do you think it is?" Daryl asked. Daryl thought it was a boy. He didn't have any reason to think it was a boy, but he kind of thought it was.

"I really don't know." Michonne said.

"What'cha want the baby to be?" Daryl asked.

"I don't know." Michonne responded.

"Boy ain't you great at conversation, 'Chonne." Daryl said. She snickered at him, still pacing. "I think it's gonna be a boy."

"Why do you think that?" Michonne asked.

"I don't know." Daryl said. "Just seems like the right thing to think."

"Do you want a boy?" Michonne asked. Daryl thought about it a few minutes before he responded.

"I don't think so. I mean I don't really care." He said. "See, in my mind I was always gonna have four kids, and they was always gonna be two boys and two girls…all equal. So it don't matter what I get, 'cause they are both important to me."

"I sincerely hope you don't think we're having four children." Michonne said. Daryl laughed at her.

"Nah, I don't think we're having four kids." He said. "I think we're havin' this kid and then we'll see what kinda life we have. Maybe we'll have another, you know…just to get whatever we don't get this time."

"You know, Daryl, it's not like that with babies. You don't always get the other gender next." Michonne said.

"Not me." Daryl responded. "I told ya, mine always come out even." Michonne laughed at him. "So what we gon name it?" He asked again.

"Whatever you want." She responded.

"I ain't no good at namin' things. Only thing I ever had that was mine and needin' namin' was a dog." Daryl said.

Michonne was getting tired, so she came back to bed, trying to get comfortable, which really meant trying to get as comfortable as possible.

"Well what did you name the dog?" She asked.

"Dog." Daryl said matter-of-factly. Michonne giggled.

"That's not a very good name." She said.

"Eh, didn't matter no way." Daryl said, nuzzling the back of her neck. "My dad got pissy and the dog disappeared after 'bout two days. I don't reckon it minded bein' named Dog for two days. I never had nothin' I got to keep." He paused for a minute. "Until now." He added, nuzzling her more.

Michonne felt sorry for Daryl. She didn't know all the details of his life before all of this, but she knew that it hadn't been a particularly good life. She knew he had a lot of scars, both physically and emotionally. She knew he hadn't been loved a whole lot in his life, and it was important to her to try to love him enough to make up for that. He was the best kind of man that she could imagine, and he was certainly the best kind of man that she'd ever known. She had never felt loved the way that Daryl made her feel loved. She hoped she wouldn't let him down and that he never again had to feel like he didn't have anything that was truly his. She was happy to be completely his, and she was going to do everything in her power to make sure that nothing happened to their baby, whether it was a boy or a girl, and whether or not she allowed Daryl to name it Baby. She didn't say anything, but she did reach around and gently pull his arm over her.

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Michonne had been trying to deal with the pain for as long as she could. They had started slow, dull, and very far apart, just as she was really trying to go to sleep. At first she had barely recognized it. She had thought she'd wait it out as long as she could. It was the middle of the night and she hated to have to wake everyone, because surely if one person woke up, everyone was going to be up.

Michonne didn't sleep well at all these nights, and Daryl forgave her for that. He didn't know what it felt like to have a whole human being inside your stomach, but he didn't think it would be very comfortable. He kept trying to sleep, ignoring her squirming, until she made a strange noise.

"'Chonne, you OK?" Daryl asked, not fully waking up. She didn't respond to him at first.

"I don't think so, Daryl." Michonne said. "I think it's time to go get Hershel."

Daryl sat up quickly. He was still half asleep, but he'd been waiting to hear those words and had tried to program himself to respond to them. He got out of bed. Suddenly he realized he had no idea what to do. None at all. He needed to go get Hershel, and he knew that Michonne was moving to another cell, so he needed to help her get there, but he wasn't sure which was supposed to come first. Luckily Michonne solved his problem a minute later when she started making demands.

"Help me up." She said. Daryl did help her up. He also helped her to the cell, supporting her as much as he could and he helped her get onto the pallet that Maggie and Beth had made for her. Quickly Daryl jogged down to Hershel's cell.

"Hershel! Hershel, get up! Man, the baby's comin'!" Daryl said. Hershel stirred.

"I'm coming, Daryl." Hershel said.

"Come on, Hershel! It's coming now!" Daryl said. He couldn't understand why Hershel was being so nonchalant and slowly getting out of bed.

"Calm down, Daryl. I think this is going to take a little longer than you think it is. I'll be there in a minute." Hershel said.

Daryl wanted Hershel to move faster than he was. Around him the prison was coming to life. Everyone was shuffling around with the same general nature of the Walkers. No one was talking, but everyone seemed to be shuffling in different directions, rubbing their eyes and yawning. Daryl went back to the cell with Michonne. He didn't know what to do. In all the movies that he'd seen where women had babies it had been pretty much the same thing. Their broke, usually in a restaurant or somewhere like that, then they'd started having contractions and started screaming at their husbands. Then the doctor came and five or ten minutes later they had a baby. Michonne wasn't screaming right now, right now she had her head buried in some of the pillows that Maggie had put on the mattresses and was clutching the mattress…and Hershel was taking his sweet time.

Carol brushed past Daryl into the cell. She was obviously still half asleep because she had the same Walker quality to her movements as everyone else. She got on the mattress with Michonne, and pulled her up to lean against her. He couldn't make out anything she was saying, but she was mumbling into Michonne's ear.

Hershel finally came into the room, followed by Brenda who brought lamps in and Josh who brought Hershel his bag. _No one was saying anything. _

When Michonne made another noise, it wasn't the screaming that Daryl expected. It almost sounded like some kind of animal noise. She wasn't screaming at him at all.

"It's OK, breathe through it." Hershel said. "Then we'll see where we are."

_Where we are? The baby is coming!_ Daryl thought. The noise continued.

"Are you alright, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked. He approached her and tried to pull her face around for him to see it.

"Don't get in her face." Carol said. "She's fine. She's having a baby. It's a little uncomfortable."

Daryl backed up a little. He watched Hershel do whatever it was that Hershel was doing.

"We have a ways to go." Hershel said finally. "It's gonna be a long night."

"What you mean we have a ways to go?" Daryl asked. "The baby is comin'."

Hershel got up, pulling his crutches under his arms, and balancing he put a hand on Daryl's shoulder.

"Babies take however much time they want. They don't go by anyone's clock but their own." He said. "Michonne's got a lot of work ahead of her, but it's something that none of us can help her with, all we can do is comfort her. It's going to be a while before anything important happens. You could even take a walk if you want to and I'll get someone to get you if we need you for anything."

"I think that's a good idea, Daryl." Carol said. "Why don't you take a walk?"

"Daryl…" Michonne said. Daryl came over and sat on the mattresses beside her.

"You alright?" He asked.

Michonne smiled at him. His face was so worried and confused. She wanted him to be here when the baby was born, but having him in here until then would drive everyone insane. The problem was no one had thought to explain to Daryl beforehand how this was going to be. Michonne reached up and rubbed his cheek. He leaned down and kissed her gently.

"I'm fine." She said, still smiling at him. "I think they're right. You need to take a walk. Carol will take care of me and Hershel will let you know when there's anything going on."

Daryl didn't want to leave, but if Michonne thought he should, then he would. At least she was smiling at him and talking to him instead of screaming at him that this was all his fault.

"Ok." He said after a minute. He leaned in to Michonne, "I love you, 'Chonne." He said. "Please be OK."

Michonne smiled again and pulled his face to her. She kissed him. "I am. No worries."

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The whole prison was awake and everyone was shuffling around doing things. It looked to Daryl like everyone had a purpose or something, but no one was really talking to anyone else and no one was talking to him. He'd been on a walk. He'd been on two or three walks. He felt like every time he passed by Michonne's cell, she was making those animal sounds and it looked like she was wrestling with Carol. Sometimes it looked like she was winning, and sometimes it looked like Carol was winning.

Glenn found Daryl outside, leaning against the wall, smoking one of the cigarettes that he had taken on a run.

"Cliché father." Glenn said, walking up.

"Huh?" Daryl asked.

"Cliché father. Smoking cigarettes and waiting for the baby." Glenn said.

"Man, I don't know what to do. I feel like I'm goin' fuckin' crazy. I feel like I should be doin' somethin', but I don't know what the fuck to do." Daryl said. It was pretty obvious that he was very unsure about what to do right now.

"You're doing your job." Glenn said. "We all had a job, and you're doing yours."

"What you mean?" Daryl asked.

"Carol's been planning for this for months." Glenn said. "We all had a job, except Rick, maybe. Maggie, Beth, and Rachel were responsible for getting and boiling water and for making coffee for anyone who wanted it. Brenda was in charge of making sure that she collected enough of our lamps and stuff that Hershel had however much light he needed, Josh was in charge of getting the bag that Hershel had pointed out to him. Even I had a job."

"What was your job?" Daryl asked.

"My job was to make sure the pocket watch was wound up at all times, in case Carol needed it to time things."

"I didn't get no job." Daryl said. "I didn't know nothin' 'bout no jobs."

"Well, Michonne's job is pretty obvious, and it looks like you're doing yours. You're waiting for your baby."

"Well, I don't like this job." Daryl said.

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Michonne wished Hershel would realize that telling her every now and again how much longer he thought it would be wasn't helping her very much. It felt like it had already been a few days and it felt like every minute was an eternity. She was missing very much what they had known before and missed the fact that she had not had to suffer through this with either of her girls.

She was also acutely aware, at times, of the people who passed by the cell or in the cell. She felt like the most entertaining exhibit at the zoo.

As time passed she'd become more and more thankful for Carol, who occasionally gave offered words of encouragement, but for the most part had just silently been there, reading her mind almost and succumbing to her will.

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When Maggie found Daryl outside and told him to come inside, he didn't know what to say. He just followed her to the cell. He felt like he'd been walking laps around the prison for a few days.

"Come on, Daryl." Hershel said. "It's time to make you a father."

"Come here." Carol said. "Take my place."

Daryl came and sat where she was sitting. Carol looked exhausted. Michonne just looked like she was in pain. Daryl held her, and soon he understood why Carol looked exhausted because he felt her wrestling with him. Her nails had dug into his arms in several places. Still, he made sure not to protest. At least he finally felt like he had some sort of purpose.

Finally there were cries in the cell that didn't belong to Michonne. When Carol brought the baby around, wrapped in one of the blankets that Maggie had brought them, Daryl didn't know what to do. She had placed the baby gently in Michonne's arms.

Daryl had a daughter. A little, and right now very angry looking, daughter. The baby calmed down after a few minutes, and Daryl forgot everything that was going on around him.

"Daryl…" Hershel said. "We've still got a few things to take care of here. Why don't you take your daughter and show everyone else how pretty she is?"

Daryl carefully accepted the baby. She was so tiny, and apparently already trying to sleep. The minute she was in his arms he was terrified. When going out to show everyone he walked very slowly, being sure to take it easy and to make sure that he was holding her just like Carol said.

"It's my daughter." He said coming out into the living room where most everyone had gathered to talk nervously while they waited. "We got a daughter."

Everyone had admired the baby, but Daryl hadn't offered to let anyone hold it, and no one had asked. It was obvious from the look on Daryl's face that he wasn't ready to let anyone hold it. This was his time with the baby and admiring it was fine, as was touching a tiny hand or a cheek, but he wasn't letting go of her.

"What are you going to name it?" Rachel had finally asked.

"I don't know." Daryl said. "Michonne said I could name her what I want, but I don't know what to name her."

People tossed out a few names. Daryl looked at her. She was so amazing, so beautiful, and she didn't look like any of those names.

"What about Hope?" Beth offered.

Daryl looked at Beth and smiled.

"Yeah…Hope." He said. He looked at the baby again, who he was pretty sure was soundly asleep. Hope. Daryl had a daughter, and her name was Hope. He thought that Michonne would like that name.


	25. Chapter 25

AN: In response to the baby's name I've seen people who liked it and people who didn't. I actually hung on the name for a while. While I admit it's cliché, I also considered the sources. It's Beth (and I feel the name would be something that Beth would offer up as a possibility because it's cliché) who suggests it and Daryl (who named his dog "Dog" so "Baby" could have been in the cards) who accepts it. I think it works. Anyway, it is what it is.

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"Has she eaten yet?" Carol asked, coming into the room dragging the crib. Daryl got up and helped her move it into room and put it beside the mattresses.

"Let me help you." Daryl said loudly. "Since nobody around here seems to have any manners." He said loudly again.

"Its fine, Daryl. I do things all the time without expecting people to help me.

"Not yet." Michonne said. "She hasn't asked for anything yet." The baby was lying on the bed next to her, sleeping.

"She'll ask for it when she's ready." Carol said, smiling at her.

"I know." Michonne said.

"You might want to try to get a little sleep while she's sleeping, and Daryl you need to go find yourself something to keep you busy so you don't fall asleep." Carol said.

Hope had made her much anticipated debut, but now it was morning and no one had really had much sleep. Carol was determined to keep them awake. The only ones she was allowing to sleep were Carl, Hershel, and Michonne. Sasha and Tyreese were sleeping too, but since they'd been saddled with the night watch it was normal for them to be sleeping. They'd practically become nocturnal.

"I was gonna stay with 'Chonne." Daryl said.

"Carol's right, Daryl. I could use a few minutes of sleep." Michonne said. Daryl looked annoyed. "We'll still be here, Daryl. We're not going anywhere." She added.

"Fine, I'll go find something to do." He said, leaving the cell reluctantly.

"I'll bring you something to eat when you're ready, just let me know." Carol said. "I figured I'd make you some soup."

"Sounds good, but I'm not really hungry right now." Michonne said, gently placing the baby in the crib next to her. "And Carol, thanks for helping me today."

Carol smiled. "Technically it was last night and you did most of the work yourself, but you're more than welcome."

Carol left the cell and Michonne put her head down, trying to sleep.

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When Rick came into kitchen, Carol was sitting in one of the chairs and" Maggie was circling around behind her, with a bottle of rubbing alcohol in her hand, dabbing at her arms.

"Ouch…ouch….ouch…" Carol kept saying, sucking air in through her teeth.

"I'm sorry, but you're scratched up pretty good." Maggie said.

"What?" Rick asked. "Scratched? When the hell did you get scratched and why didn't you tell me?" Carol could hear the rise in his voice, and since she felt like her arms were on fire, she was really not in the mood to deal with Rick.

"Not Walker scratched." Carol said.

"Michonne tore her up pretty good." Maggie said. "There, I think I got all of 'em." She said. Carol stood and shook her arms.

Rick was just standing there.

"Can I help you with something, Rick?" Carol asked, sounding annoyed and still flapping her arms.

"Where's Hershel?" Rick asked.

"I don't know, Rick. I think he was taking a nap." Carol said.

"Well, I need to talk to him." Rick said. He stood there for a minute longer and then turned around.

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Rick hadn't seen Hershel until dinner time. He hadn't originally planned to have this conversation in front of all of the group. The problem with conversations with the group was that everyone felt they could throw in their opinions about things and that all their opinions should be equally weighed. The women, especially, tended to be sentimental and sentimental wasn't going to get them anywhere. Rick knew talking about his decision to move on was going to be difficult for a lot of them, but it was something.

"Hershel," Rick asked, "how long do you think it's going to be before Michonne could be ready to travel?"

Daryl wasn't surprised by Rick's question. He knew that Rick was brooding about when it would be possible to move the group. He could tell by everyone else's expression, though, that the thought hadn't really occurred to them. They were comfortable here, and they were pretty safe.

"I can't say exactly Rick. I think for her to be back to her old self it would take probably six months." Hershel said. He took another forkful of food.

"Be realistic, Hershel." Rick said.

"I am being realistic." Hershel said. "Even if she bounces back quickly, she's not physically what she used to be. She doesn't have the same stamina that she had then and that won't come back over night."

"Hershel's right." Carol said. "Her body's gone through a lot of changes and she hasn't exactly been working out like she used to."

"Her katana's been our cell since we killed the Governor." Daryl said.

"Look, we don't have six months. We're going to need supplies before that time is over. We need to get going as soon as we possibly can." Rick said.

"We can make other runs." Maggie offered.

"If we make other runs we use more gas. We're not finding tons of gas. It makes more sense to use that gas moving on. We're more likely to get farther and find more gas if we move on. Your father can't travel on foot, Maggie, not realistically." Rick said.

"Ugh, do we really have to talk about this right now?" Glenn asked. He was so tired he couldn't stand it and Carol kept thumping him on the back of the ear to keep him awake.

"I think Glenn's right." Carol said. "Even if it's something we need to discuss, it would be better if everyone got some sleep before we talked about it."

"And Michonne needs to be part of the discussion too." Daryl said.

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Daryl found Rick in the watchtower later. He was tired, but he still wanted to talk to him. Rick had gotten up from the table in an obviously irritable mood, and Daryl thought it might be best to try to talk him down a little in private before he took it back to the group.

"Look, Rick, it ain't that anybody's sayin' we ain't gonna move on…it's just that we might not be movin' on as soon as you'd like." Daryl tried to explain.

"Daryl, I don't think you're getting me here. Michonne isn't the only factor we've got to think about here. We don't know what we're going to find when we move on. We don't know how long it's going to take us to get somewhere where we can actually find what we need and find a new place to hole up for a while. We need to try to get to that place before it gets too cold or we could all freeze to death. Hershel can't travel on foot, and you know it. He wouldn't make it three days on foot. We can't keep wasting gas on runs just because everyone wants to play house. If we keep making longer runs, we will run out of gas before the winter is over, run out of supplies, and then our only choice is to go on walking, completely open to all the dangers. That's not safe for anyone. I'm trying to keep this group alive, Daryl, the _whole_ group."

"If we leave too soon and she ain't ready, then she ain't gonna be able to be much help in fightin' anything and she may not even be able to defend herself good." Daryl said.

"Beth can't defend herself, Hershel can barely defend himself, Maggie's and Carol's abilities are questionable at times, Rachel isn't exactly a fighter, and we don't even know what the two kids we hauled in here can do…she'll be in good company and she can get stronger as we travel." Rick said. "No matter what, we're taking chances, Daryl. If we stay here we're actually just setting the odds to be more against us later."

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"I'm really too tired to talk about this, Daryl." Michonne said after Daryl had insisted on recounting to her everything that Rick had said.

"But what do you think about it, Michonne?" Daryl asked.

"Daryl, what I think is that the baby is sleeping, and she won't be for too long, and I need to sleep. Can we please talk about this later?"

Daryl sighed. "Yeah, 'Chonne, go to sleep." Daryl was tired too. His head was screaming at him that he needed to sleep, but he had so much on his mind. At about this time the night before he had been in bed with Michonne in their cell, his hand still on her belly, just peacefully sleeping. Now he had a tiny, fragile baby girl and was worried about soon he'd have to take her out there into the world that they had barely survived. He also worried that if Michonne were reduced to the status of Beth, as far as defending herself, he wasn't going to be able to take care of all three of them, and that thought made him feel dizzy and sick.

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"You know, I hate to say this…" Michonne said. She was sitting with Carol while Carol did the laundry. "But Rick is right."

Carol considered Michonne's comment. Michonne had recounted to her everything that Daryl had told her about his conversation with Rick. Carol knew they had to move on, they'd known all along that the prison was just temporary, but she really hated the thought of going back out there. For her it was more about enjoying feeling safe. Out there you were never safe and you spent every day, all day, worrying that another member of the group wasn't going to make it through that day. You spent all your time worrying about who would be next. Carol had to admit that there had been times when she'd wished that _she_ was next, just to be done with the worry and the heartbreak when they finally did lose someone.

"When do you think is a good time to go?" Carol asked.

"I don't know." Michonne confessed. "I mean I was the healthiest I've ever been when I got pregnant. I should bounce back quicker than I did in the past. I can start working with my katana soon. I don't know how long it's going to take me to build up to what I was, but I know it only took me a couple of weeks when I first started using it to be able to use it for a while without feeling like my muscles were screaming. I just got better the more I used it."

Carol didn't respond. Michonne searched the yard with her eyes, finally finding Daryl roaming around. He was taking Hope for a walk, he said.

"He never puts her down." Michonne said. Carol looked up at her and followed her line of vision, but she already knew that she was talking about Daryl.

It was true. Michonne felt like she only really held Hope to feed her or change her diaper. The rest of the time Daryl wanted to be holding her. He actually looked sad whenever it was time for Michonne to feed her, and he'd wait patiently until she was done for Michonne to burp her and give her back to him. He wouldn't pick her up yet, though. He would wait for Michonne to pick her up and put her in his arms and he seldom changed her position at all once Michonne settled her in. He also wouldn't change her diaper, and it had less to do with any aversion to the chore and more to do with the fact that he was wildly terrified that he would accidentally poke her with a pin or would hurt her by lifting her up.

"She's a good baby." Carol said. "She hardly ever cries unless she's hungry or needs to be changed."

"What would she have to cry about? Her daddy is constantly entertaining her." Michonne said.

"I think it's sweet." Carol said. She had known that Daryl was going to be excited about the baby, but she hadn't imagined that he was going to be this excited about her. He had gotten mad at her because she had suggested that he put Hope in her crib to sleep during dinner instead of trying to insist on holding her at the table while she slept.

Carol knew why Daryl and Michonne had disagreed a little when they were discussing what Rick had said. She'd spent enough time around them both at this point that she felt she could read them pretty well. Though they seemed to fit together almost flawlessly, Carol recognized that there were fundamental differences in the two of them and even though it was actually those difference that made them work so well as a couple, in this case the differences were making it a little more difficult for each of them to fully understand or accept the other.

Michonne was a very practical person, and very much a "just go ahead and do it if it needs to be done" kind of person. She knew that Rick was right about the need to move on sooner rather than later, and she accepted it. Her response was that if she had to do it, then she just had to do it, and do it the best that she could. It wasn't that wasn't concerned about the risks, but she saw the risks as something she couldn't get around, so she'd just have to face them. Carol imagined that whatever happened to Michonne's child before had probably been the cause of Michonne's attitude toward life. If she felt anything like Carol did when she had lost Sophia, then she felt like she'd already walked through Hell. They all responded to those things differently, and Michonne had tried to harden herself and keep both eyes on the road, so to speak.

Daryl was different. Daryl wasn't as good as Michonne was at putting feelings aside when he had to face a challenge. Even though Daryl knew that Rick was right about the need to move on as quickly as possible, Daryl was rejecting it because he was afraid of what the future held. Daryl had changed a lot over the course of the last year. He'd become a much happier person than Carol had known him to be before, and he was afraid of losing that happiness. It wasn't that Daryl actually had any huge argument against what Rick had said, but he understood that moving on was risking his family, and that was something he'd never dealt with before. He didn't know how to deal with it, so the only thing that he could do was try to reject it.

Michonne heard Hope start to wail and saw Daryl heading back toward them. She started unbuttoning her shirt, looking around for the blanket she had brought out with her.

"Back of the chair." Carol said.

Michonne wasn't particularly modest, but she had done her best to try to stay covered when she realized a few days ago that Carl seemed particularly interested in what she was doing, though he hadn't said anything. She knew that Rick had already had to have quite the conversation with Carl about the birds and the bees, due to the limited privacy of the prison, but she wasn't sure that she wanted to be his first exposure to breasts, although, if they were moving on she was sure that worse things would happen to push him toward growing up even more. There wasn't a lot of innocence to be had anymore.

"Boy, she's got some lungs." Daryl said, as he approached. "Just woke up and decided she was starving." He leaned down and let Michonne gently lift the baby out of his arms. He sat down on the ground next to her and watched her feed Hope. It was a nice day outside and he was enjoying it. He really hated the idea of leaving the prison, even though he knew they had to. He also knew they would be doing it relatively soon, since they were going to discuss it that night and Michonne had already told him that she was going to tell the group that she agreed with Rick. Daryl felt like the group, hearing that Michonne was not only OK with the plan but supported it, would probably end up not fighting it too much. He wasn't mad at her, but they had kind of argued about it a little bit. He hoped she wasn't too angry with him. Daryl slid a little closer to Michonne's chair.

Michonne knew Daryl was fretting about the argument. It hadn't even been what she would consider a serious argument. It had more or less just been that each of them had stated how they felt and it turned out that the way they felt wasn't exactly the same. Actually, Michonne thought, they did feel the same way about it, but she was just quicker at accepting that fear for the future or not, they had to go. She also understood that Daryl was going to be a little slower in accepting it.

Michonne nudged Daryl with her foot and he looked up at her. She winked at him and smiled. Daryl grinned back at her.


	26. Chapter 26

AN: I realize for fans that are looking for a solely Michonne/Daryl fanfic, this one can be frustrating. While I view them as the most important/main characters, I view the group dynamic as very important to their development and to the development of the story. That being said, as we continue our journey together and with the characters, there are going to be places where the other characters are very heavily involved.

Also, please be patient. Remember that I'm on this journey too, just a few miles ahead of you, and sometimes I am just as surprised as you will be about what's around the next bend. That being said, let's get going, shall we?

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The group had settled on two months to get ready. The entire mood of the prison had changed dramatically since the declaration. Everyone was sullen and sad. They all had plenty to get done in preparation for the move, but no one looked happy as they bustled about packing things and preparing. No one wanted to go. The prison was an imperfect home, but it had become their home.

Michonne had been excused from the packing work. She, instead, focused her time on working with her katana and trying to get in the best shape she could. It had been slow going and she was disappointed that her body wasn't responding as quickly as she hoped. It was responding, but not the way that she'd planned.

Daryl hated the getting ready part. He helped pack the vehicles they'd be taking with whatever Carol designated him to carry, and he met with Rick as often as needed to discuss and re-discuss the practicalities of their travel. They talked about it a lot, but the problem was that for all Rick's desires to be organized and have "plan", Daryl felt there really was no plan. All they really knew was that they were going, and they were hoping for the best. What Daryl hated most of all about all of this was that his time with Michonne was limited, and his time with Hope was even more limited. At least he could force Michonne to stay up a little later at night with him, but he felt like Hope was almost always asleep when he got to hold her after dinner, in the moments before he would go to sleep. He got up with Michonne whenever she fed Hope, and sat there rubbing the baby's face with his finger while she ate, but it hadn't been like the first week and half when he'd been able to watch her as much as he liked.

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Carol divided her time between the domestic daily chores, the packing that Rick supervised to some degree, and caring for Hope and Judith. Hershel, who had relatively few responsibilities, helped her out with all that he could, but he helped her out the most with the babies.

"Do you think Michonne is overdoing it?" Carol asked Hershel. He was changing Hope and fumbling with the pins, so Carol helped him.

"I do think she's overdoing it, but I can't really say that I don't understand." Hershel said. "She's a mother now."

"She was a mother before." Carol said. "You don't stop being a mother just because you lose your child. You still feel like a mother."

Hershel nodded his head a little. "But now she's a mother with a baby. Her first instinct is going to be to protect that baby, and she feels like she's not ready to do that."

"Do you think that Hope is going to make it?" Carol asked. She hated asking such a thing, but she'd been thinking, rather morbidly, about if any of them would make it. The truth was, everyone was thinking the same things. Everyone had become so down, and Carol knew it was because they were thinking about who wouldn't be with them for much longer.

"If Hope doesn't make it, it will either be a freak accident or it will be because Michonne doesn't make it." Hershel said. He had no idea how Michonne had lost her children before, but he was fairly confident that it was because she had not had any control whatsoever in the situation. Now that he saw how she was with Hope, he couldn't see her as being the kind of mother that would ever stand for anything threatening her child. "I'm concerned about Judith." He added.

Carol knew it was true. Judith had become more or less a community child. She had a number of caregivers, but no one had actually taken on the job of mothering her to the degree that they had that instinctual need to protect her. Carol hated to admit that even she lacked the same feelings for Judith that she had for Sophia. She would protect Judith, and she'd do it to the best of her abilities, but she didn't have the same drive to protect her. She would protect her more out of pity than necessity.

Judith was something of a challenge for the group. Rick had almost completely dismissed the child. There would be no indication to an outsider that it was his child. Carl had a certain relationship with her, but it was a complicated one. Carl was a complicated child. Carol didn't fully understand Carl, and she was pretty sure that even Carl didn't understand Carl. Carol wondered if Sophia would have become as complex as Carl had if she'd have lived longer. The problem was the world around them. As adults, with former life experience, they had trouble taking in all the changes around them in this cruel, unfair, cold world. Carl had come into himself a good bit in that world. He seemed to have less trouble understanding and accepting the things that happened than even Hershel, and it saddened Carol a little to see that. She wondered what life would be like for Judith and Hope, if they made it, when they had been raised entirely in this world that made so little sense, with no knowledge of what it had been like before. The world had been confusing and hard to deal with before all this, but now it was utter chaos and that was what was going to be the "normal" to the young ones.

"She's got me and Beth and Maggie." Carol said. Hershel nodded.

"I just wonder if it's enough."

"Is any of it enough, Hershel?" Carol asked.

"No." He said. "Carol…" Hershel started, "I'm not going to make it out there long."

"Don't be silly." Carol said, though secretly she had her doubts.

"I'm serious, Carol. I know it's survival of the fittest out there." Hershel said. Carol, concerned, had come over and put her arm around him. "I'm only saying this because I want you to tell my girls when it's time. I'm an old man. I've lived a good life, for the most part, and I'm ready to go when that time comes." He said. "I am really fine with it. Sometimes I think I'd rather go before all this happens, maybe quietly in my sleep. I've seen enough death." He added.

Carol didn't know what to say or if saying anything would be appropriate, so she just rubbed his back a moment, choosing not to say anything.

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As time ticked past, it seemed like everyone wanted to bury themselves in their work, but they'd been so efficient that most of what they had to do was getting done far faster than they'd intended. When they were left with silences, most of them kept busy circling the fences as though there were any huge threats on the horizon and as though someone hadn't passed by the same patch they were inspecting less than a half an hour earlier.

A few of them worked on their aim, shooting cans from a distance. Others just silently brooded.

Glenn was pretty sure if he had ever committed a crime great enough to warrant the death sentence, this is what it would feel like to wait on death row, ticking off the days on the wall and thinking about the fact that the end was coming.

_The end was coming_. There was nothing that could be done about it. He and Maggie had discussed it before the life of the prison had lulled them into their false sense of being safe. It was coming for everyone, and it always had, but now there seemed to be more of an urgency as to when it was coming. They had talked about what they would do if the other went first, and the only thing that had been made clear is that neither really wanted to be without the other.

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"I guess I'm as ready as I'm going to be." Michonne had said, their last night in the prison, according to Rick's calendar, which was scrawled across the kitchen wall. Daryl had been questioning her about her level of preparedness for whatever tasks they faced. She didn't feel like talking about it. Though she was at least confident that she could hold her own in a small fight, she knew she lacked the stamina and strength she'd had before, and that worried her more than a little.

"Can we make love?" Daryl asked her, kissing her shoulder and appreciating the time that their daughter was offering them. She was sleeping peacefully in her crib and she was recently full.

"We can if you want to." Michonne offered.

Michonne was not surprised by Daryl's forward movements, nor by his somewhat forceful behavior. She hadn't seen Daryl under the amount of stress that she was certain he was carrying around right now. She felt a little of the same feeling that she was sure was closing in on him and on everyone else. It was a feeling of impending doom. As Daryl pushed into her all she could think was "tonight we drink for tomorrow we die". She tried to put it out of her mind and focus on the moment she was in.

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The next day the group was nearly silent. Breakfast had consisted of maybe six words and they had only been necessary, Michonne thought. Gone were the days of idle chitchat and happy bantering that they had enjoyed through these last months. Carol gave out breakfast reluctantly and everyone ate with the same general nature. It was their last meal in the prison and feelings were written all over the faces of nearly everyone gathered.

Everyone was recalling their times at the prison. The moments when they had almost been able to forget entirely what was out there and what the world had become. Michonne, herself, was wrapped up in thought. She remembered the night that she'd sat drinking warm beer and listening to the group's idle chatting. She remembered the first clumsy experience with Daryl at the pharmacy, and what the looks on their faces had been when she'd unveiled the impending arrival of Hope. She remembered the feeling of victory that they had shared when they had ridded themselves of the Governor. So much had happened there, most of it trivial, but the trivial moments were the ones most savored these days.

After they ate, there was the job of insuring, for the last time, that they had everything they needed. Michonne watched as Daryl checked his saddlebags and people started piling into the vehicles.

"I'll take Hope." Carol said, gently lifting the baby out of Michonne's arms. Michonne hated to relinquish her, but it had been decided that she would travel with Daryl and Hope was much safer in the car with Carol than she would be on the motorcycle, even strapped to Michonne between the two of them. Without another word, Michonne watched Carol get into the car and she slung her katana, which she was holding in one hand, onto her back and walked toward the bike to settle in behind Daryl.

"Are you ready?" Rick asked approaching the bike.

"Yeah, man. I guess so." Daryl said. He could feel Michonne's warmth against him as she wrapped her arms around him and leaned her head against him.

"Tyreese is going to open the gates when you get down there and he's got a spot in the last car." Rick said. Remember not to go too fast. I'll flash my lights if I need you to stop or if there's a problem behind me. You signal if you need to stop."

"I got it, Rick." Daryl said.

"We need to get as far as possible today. Before dark we'll start looking for somewhere to hole up for the night." Rick said.

Daryl had only nodded in response and Rick turned to head back to the car. Daryl started the motorcycle and drove slowly through the prison yard and out of the gates, determined not to look back. He tried to focus, for a moment, only on the feeling of Michonne pressed against him.


	27. Chapter 27

Daryl was tired of riding, they'd been at it all day stopping only once, and that had been hours ago. Daryl knew, though, that they would be stopping soon to avoid running out of daytime. He would probably stop the caravan at the next place that he saw that could be used for cover for the night.

"Carol, can you _please_ shut that thing up!" Rick growled.

"No, Rick, I can't." Carol said. "She's literally starving." Hope was wailing uncontrollably and flailing. Carol was having a difficult time holding her. At first she had kept her calm by giving her pacifier and replacing it any time she spit it out. Then, when Hope had begun wailing despite the fact that Carol was trying to hold it in her mouth, she had fooled her a few times with her knuckle, but that hadn't warded off the screaming for long.

"Rick, she's only two months old. She can't understand like the rest of us that sometimes you've just got to be hungry for a little while." Hershel said.

Rick didn't want to be the one to signal a stop, and they weren't in the greatest spot to stop, but he didn't see any place more inviting and the sound of the baby was making him more irritated than he could stand. He really felt like he could break its neck if he had to hear the screaming any longer. He flicked his lights and came to a stop, the others stopping behind him. Daryl stopped a minute later.

Michonne got off the bike and Daryl's back felt wet when the air hit it. It was pretty hot, but he couldn't imagine that they were sweating that much.

"Why the fuck do I feel wet?" He asked, swinging off the bike. He looked at Michonne and her shirt was soaked.

"Sorry." She said.

Carol got out the car and came around to Michonne, handing her the wailing infant. Michonne unbuttoned her shirt, no longer concerned with being at all modest, and started feeding her.

Rick was walking toward Glenn and Maggie's car and Daryl grabbed his crossbow and jogged over, passing Beth and Hershel who were going to join Carol and Michonne. Glenn had gotten out the car and walked away from the caravan, but everyone else just stayed in the car, waiting to continue the journey.

"Music to my ears." Rick said as Daryl came up next to him.

"What is?" Daryl asked.

"The sound of your kid shutting the hell up." Rick said.

"Man, she's just a baby. Go easy on her." Daryl said. He could easily see that Rick was in a really wretched mood right now. "I didn't think about her needin' to eat all the time. Maybe Michonne should ride with Glenn and Maggie for a while, until Hope don't eat so much."

"It would be a good idea." Rick said. At least it would get the wailing child out of his car. Judith could be cranky sometimes, but she wasn't a big crier. Hope, however, left his ears still ringing.

"Where'd Glenn go?" Daryl asked.

"To take a piss. When he gets back we can start again. Michonne can finish feeding the baby in the car."

"I'm gonna stop at the next place that looks alright." Daryl said. "We don't need to be on the road too much longer."

"Sounds fine to me. Your call on what looks good." Rick said.

As Glenn came running back, and Daryl and Rick realized he was not alone, they also heard Beth scream. It was a herd of Walkers, and they were already on them.

Glenn got near the group and turned, starting to pick off the ones that he could. Rick and Daryl immediately went to work on the ones around them. Daryl had only glanced momentarily in Michonne's direction, but he could see she had her katana already out.

"It's like they're getting faster." Glenn called out.

"Maybe they're faster because they haven't smelled food in a while." Daryl said. He was suddenly a little annoyed with his crossbow, feeling like it was taking him longer than he wanted to take down the approaching Walkers.

Beth had Judith and she was crying, the baby was howling again. Michonne had not had time to pass her to anyone when the first Walker was on her, so now she was desperately trying to hold the baby with her left arm and fight with her right.

"Can you shut it up?" Rick called. He was fumbling to reload his gun quickly and wondered if all of the noise coming from that bunch was drawing more Walkers than there had been originally in this herd.

"A little busy here, Rick!" Michonne growled.

Glenn thought the herd was thinning a little. He realized how rusty he had become during his time at the prison. He was slower at reloading and getting off shots than he used to be. They were all slower. He had been casting quick glances checking the others. They wouldn't have looked this haggard before after working on a herd this size. It was a big herd, but it wasn't the kind of herd that they couldn't handle.

The one who was in the worst position at this moment was Michonne. Glenn had saw her fighting over there, like he would have imagined some kind of Amazon woman fighting. She was trying to cover everyone clustered behind her. Apparently they were unarmed when the herd approached because none of them were helping her. Glenn kept shooting in her direction, attempting to take out a few for her in between shooting the ones that were still approaching him. He wasn't in a good position to help, but he figured that every little bit was more than nothing. When he could move that far he was going to head over there to help her because it didn't look like she could hold out too much longer.

Rick had glanced in Michonne's direction and had realized that she was the only one armed in the bunch. _What the hell were they doing unarmed? This wasn't the prison anymore. You didn't go to the bathroom without a gun._ He fired off a few rounds in her direction, hoping to take down a few that were approaching her. Soon he'd be able to move and get closer to the bunch, since it looked like most of what was left of the herd was heading in her direction. If the babies weren't crying and Beth would stop screaming, she might have more of a chance.

Daryl was slowly edging his way toward Michonne. "Carol…" he called, lowering his crossbow for a minute, "heads up!" Daryl threw an arrow in Carol's direction. It wasn't an ideal weapon for Carol, but at least it was something. At least she could help in some way because they had more coming in their direction and he worried that Michonne had her hands a little too full.

There were too many coming. Michonne's arms were both screaming, her left from trying to hold the baby, which kept slipping, and her right from trying to swing the katana as fast as she could at approaching Walkers. She hadn't been able to take her eyes off the herd, but she had seen a few of the Walkers go down in front of her, so she knew that the others were trying to offer her some assistance. She was grateful when Carol stepped up beside her and stabbed a Walker in the forehead. At least one person helping was better than nothing, but the bunch that was coming worried her.

Glenn was starting to make his way around to Michonne now, still picking off a few Walkers for her when he had time to help. He could see there was another bunch headed in her direction and he wanted to make his way over there before they arrived. If she didn't have help before they closed in he knew she wasn't going to hold out and in one sweep they would lose Michonne, Carol, Beth, Hershel, and both babies. He had to get over there to stop it.

The next bunch that was sauntering in her direction would barely give them a minute to rest. Michonne didn't know what the other side looked like, but she was praying to see an arrow fly by her at any moment to start picking off the incoming Walkers. She felt like she could barely lift her katana anymore and she could hear Carol panting.

When Hershel hobbled past Carol she didn't know what to say or do. "Hershel, get back!" She yelled at him. He hadn't responded, he just continued in the direction of the upcoming fifteen or twenty Walkers. He never said anything, and he never stopped.

Help arrived too late for Michonne and Carol and they hadn't been able to pick off the upcoming group quickly enough. They'd never had a chance at saving Hershel. With the last of the Walkers put down, there was a moment of stunned disbelief that fell over everyone. Maggie had been the one to break that universal shock of everyone who had been outside of the car, screaming and running toward them. Beth had followed as the second to regain her senses and fall by her sister's side, crying and still clutching a crying Judith. Carol had been third, kneeling down and wrapping her arms around them.

Michonne only came to her senses when she felt Daryl taking the baby from her. He reached his hand around, pulling her shirt closed. She absent mindedly sheathed her katana and fumbled with the buttons. The reality of what she had seen in front of her still not sinking in at all yet.

"Glenn, get the shovels." Daryl said. Glenn hadn't moved or flinched and Daryl realized he was still in shock. "Glenn…Glenn…Go get the shovels." Glenn had looked at him then, a look mixed of terror and sorrow on his face. He didn't say anything, but he did start walking toward the car.

"We don't have time to bury him." Rick said. Daryl could see that Rick was fighting something right now. They were all fighting something.

"Rick, man, it was Hershel." Daryl said quietly.

"What are we going to do, just hang around out here digging a hole? What if another herd comes up?" Rick asked. He looked very angry, but Daryl didn't think he was really angry with him.

"Rick," He repeated, "it was Hershel." Rick looked at him and for a moment the furrow in his brow softened.

Glenn came back with the shovels.

"Alright, we'll take care of this." Rick said. "Everybody get in the car." No one moved. "Everybody get in the cars now! We can't do this and take care of you if another herd were to come." Rick barked. "Now!"

Carol helped Maggie and Beth back to the car and Michonne took the baby and followed them.

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"This was the most senseless death ever." Rick said, digging.

"It wasn't senseless, Rick, not entirely." Glenn said. "Preventable…but not senseless."

"Hershel didn't have to die today, Glenn. All three of them should have known better than to be unarmed like that. When you're on the outside, you carry a weapon. That was rule number one of life at the prison and we're _always_ on the outside now." Rick said. They finally had the hole dug and tried to move Hershel to it as respectfully as possible, trying not to really let themselves think about what they were doing.

"He knew what he was doing, Rick." Daryl said. "He was buying them time, and he'd do it again if he had the chance. You know that."

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Michonne was feeding Hope and watching the men outside the car. Later she would check Hope for bruises, sure that she'd probably suffered a few in the fight, but she seemed generally OK so Michonne thought she hadn't suffered any great injury. Carol was in the back seat with the girls, trying to comfort them. Michonne reached up and wiped a few tears from under her eyes. Everyone was going to be grieving this and she, for one, had a very heavy heart.

In the same moment she was experiencing so many different emotions that she wasn't really sure how to process them all. She felt guilty for Hershel's death. If she could have done more, then he wouldn't have done what he did. She had failed him and he had saved her…saved them. She would have failed them all. At the same time she was grateful to Hershel and she wished she could thank him in some way, but she'd never have that opportunity. She'd never get to thank him for saving her life, for saving her daughter's life. He'd given up his own life to give them a little more time.

She could only imagine what Maggie and Beth were going through right now. She'd lost both her parents, but it had been before all this had happened. It had been hard losing them, and some days she still missed them, but even seeing her mother go after suffering from cancer and seeing her father go from a massive heart attack, it was nothing like what they had just seen. She was glad Carol was comforting them because she didn't think that she could talk right now, and even if she could, she knew she had no idea what to say to them.

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When they finished, Glenn took the shovels. For a moment Rick looked at Daryl, but he didn't say anything. There wasn't anything left to say. Daryl walked alone back to his motorcycle and picked it up. It had gotten knocked over in the madness. He didn't crank it until he'd heard the three vehicles behind him crank. For a moment he was glad that he was alone on the motorcycle, not being able to imagine what it must have been like in the cars where you were surrounded by other people. It was better to be alone with your thoughts in a time like this.

Daryl cranked his motorcycle and tried to put his mind on the task of finding a place for them to go. They had said they were looking for a "safe" place to go, but Daryl realized that it didn't really matter. They just needed somewhere to go. There was nowhere safe anymore.

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AN: Apologies to any of you who just suffered a South Park "OMG, you killed Kenny" moment. Believe me, this was a hard chapter to write, and I know that more difficult times are ahead that are also going to be difficult to write.

A moment of silence for our fallen friend.


	28. Chapter 28

_He's fuckin' crazy if he thinks we're leaving today._ Daryl thought, coming back into the barn. The night before no one had felt like doing anything. They'd brought in only the necessities and had gone to sleep wherever they saw fit to make a bed. No one was stirring except Daryl, Tyreese, and Rick. Daryl was pretty sure he heard Maggie and Beth crying in the loft, but, but that was about it. This was not a group that would be leaving today.

"Man, I'm fuckin' starvin'." Daryl said to no one. Judith was crawling around unattended, apparently having decided she didn't want to stay on the pile of hay that Carol had designated as her bed. She was crying. Daryl went over and picked her up since no one else had moved to do it. "Looks like I'm not the only one." He said to Judith. She quit crying. He heard Hope start to make the squeaky little noise that she made right before she started crying.

"Daryl." Michonne called.

Daryl walked over there.

"I really don't think I can pick Hope up." Michonne admitted. Her arms were killing her from overworking them the day before and sleeping on the barn floor hadn't helped keep her from being stiff and pained. "You're going to have to help me."

"What'cha want me to do?" Daryl asked.

"You're going to have to put her on me. She can lay on me and eat. I can hold her on with my left arm, but I can't pick her up right now." Michonne said. Daryl put Judith on the floor and got on his knees. Judith was pulling at his pants and crying.

"Hang on a sec, Lil' Asskicker. I ain't forgot about ya." He said. She kept pulling at his pants." Daryl unbuttoned Michonne's shirt and carefully picked up Hope, who had officially begun to wail now.

Wincing, and using her left arm, Michonne helped Daryl position Hope on her so that she could eat. Michonne imagined this wasn't the most pleasant meal that Hope had enjoyed, but it was all that she could handle right this minute, and Hope, who was a pretty greedy eater, and therefore not too picky, didn't seem to mind much.

"Can you feed Lil' Asskicker?" Daryl asked.

"No, Daryl. Just go get some of her formula out of the car and feed her." Michonne said.

Daryl got up and picked Judith up again, who immediately stopped crying. Outside Rick was pretty much just pacing around, so when Daryl opened the back of the car to start looking for formula, he came over to him.

"Daryl…" Rick started up. "I don't think it's safe to stay here two days."

"Well, we're stayin' at least two days." Daryl said, still rifling through a box.

"What if a really big herd comes through? We can't keep them out of the barn." Rick said.

"And we couldn't fight 'em if we moved on. The way I see it is we stand more of a chance in the barn for a couple of days." Daryl said. _Where was the damn formula?_

"Daryl, we can't just sit here and do nothing." Rick said. "We'll run out of water before two days is up and then what will we do?"

"Listen, Rick, the best thing I can tell you right now is to take your gun, get yourself a bucket, take Tyreese and go find some water. We're stayin' here for a couple of days. We got three things that gotta be done today. Someone has gotta give the group a major pep talk, and someone has got to come up with a better plan than we're just gonna keep on goin' to no damn where while we decide in the car who will be the next person we're gonna feed to a bunch of nasty ass walkers. The third person is gonna have to take a walk with a bucket and find some damn water. Right now, I'm thinkin' you're the better man to take the bucket." Daryl said, still not looking up from rifling around in supplies.

Rick snorted, but Daryl was surprised to see that he walked away to go do just that.

"Lil' Asskicker, who packed these fuckin' boxes? It had to be Beth. Beth is no longer allowed to pack boxes. It looks like she just lined 'em up and threw shit at 'em." Finally he found a can of formula. "Got it!" Daryl sat the baby in the back of the car and put a pacifier in her mouth just before she could start crying again.

"Calm down, Lil' Asskicker, can't you see I got the can now?" Daryl actually felt like finding the can had been a great victory. He hadn't seen a bottle in any of this digging, but he figured he could figure out a way to help her drink it straight out of the can. That was until he opened the can and found out that formula was a powder. He looked at it discouraged and put the lid back on. "Come on, we ain't done yet." He said, picking the baby up with his other arm.

Daryl stood over Michonne with a can of formula in one arm and Judith in the other looking very annoyed.

"Can't you just feed her?" He asked. "You ain't usin' the other one."

Michonne laughed a little. "I am going to use that one now. I need you to turn the baby around for me." She said. "And before you ask about this one, no I'm not going to feed her. Judith wouldn't know how to feed from me, it's a skill set she doesn't have."

Daryl put Judith on the floor and she pulled out the pacifier and began to wail again. He got down on his knees and she started tugging at him again. He helped Michonne position Hope on the other side. "What kinda skill you need? You just put your mouth on it and suck. Seems to me like Lil' Asskicker's smart enough to figure that out."

"You wouldn't understand, Daryl, just feed her the formula." Michonne said, smiling.

"I don't know how to make it into formula. It's just powder." Daryl said.

"There are directions on the can, Daryl. Just measure out the powder in the bottle, add the water, and shake it up."

"Ain't got no bottle, neither. Yours is already mixed up. That could be a lot easier." Daryl said, having picked Judith back up so that she would stop crying.

Michonne smiled at the two of them. They'd often joked about Judith and her seemingly endless patience. If she wanted something and you picked her up, she would quit crying for as long as you needed her to. It was like she had learned that as long as you were holding her, she might not yet have what she wanted, but it was on its way.

"Check the back seat of Rick's car. There was a bag in there with some of Judith's stuff in it and I'm positive there's a bottle in there." Michonne said.

Daryl reluctantly started out the door again with Judith. By the time that he finally succeeded in finding the bottle and making the formula, Daryl was wholly convinced his plan had been a lot better than Michonne's in this case, but either way he finally had something to offer the baby.

"Yeah, now you gon' eat, but I ain't seen Carol attemptin' to make me nothin'." Daryl said. He carried Judith back inside and decided he needed to have a talk with Carol, who wasn't up yet. "Anyone here willin' to feed a baby?" Daryl asked. "I done all the hard stuff already."

"I'll do it." Sasha said. She was helping Michonne with Hope. Once she laid her down, she got up and took Judith from Daryl.

Daryl walked over to where Carol was lying, in the fetal position, and sat down. She wasn't asleep. She looked like she'd been crying, but she wasn't asleep. Daryl put his hand on her arm.

"I want to go back to the prison." Carol said, not moving.

"We can't go back to the prison, Carol, we gotta go forward, not backward." Daryl said.

"One day, Daryl. Hershel didn't even last one day out here before he committed suicide, what makes you think it'll be any different for the rest of us?"

"Don't think like that, Carol. Hershel didn't commit suicide, he gave himself up." Daryl said.

"It's the same thing." Carol said.

"No it ain't." Daryl responded. "Suicide is selfish, you do it just 'cause you're thinkin' 'bout you and how much you hurt. What Hershel did wasn't selfish it at all, he did it 'cause he was thinkin' that he didn't want everyone else to get hurt." Daryl said. "We gotta go on, we owe that much to Hershel. If you was to go back to the prison, you would be sayin' that Hershel died for nothin'. You gotta go on and you gotta live 'cause he gave you that."

"I felt like I could live at the prison." Carol said. "Now I feel like I'm just waiting to die, like we're all just waiting to die. It's like today it'll be me, tomorrow it'll be Beth…we're all just waiting to die."

"I reckon we are all just waitin' to die, but we gotta make sure we're waitin' a long time." Daryl said. "We're gonna go on, Carol, and we're gonna find somewhere even _better_ than the prison." Daryl had been thinking about it, and he thought he might have a pretty good idea. He was going to present it to the group later. He was just going to present it, he wasn't going to talk to Rick about it first. Today Daryl didn't care about what Rick thought. He had sent Rick off with a bucket. Today Daryl felt like he was in charge. The only thing he cared about right now was convincing Carol to make him something to eat.

Carol sat up and wiped her eyes, looking at Daryl. There was something in his tone of voice that she hadn't heard a lot from Daryl. Daryl sounded _sure_ of what he just said. He had said it as matter of factly as he would have told you his name was Daryl Dixon.

"Do you really believe that?" Carol asked.

"I do." Daryl said. Carol hugged him. She didn't say anything, she just hugged him for a few minutes and Daryl finally hugged her back. When they pulled apart, Daryl looked deep in thought.

"Carol…" He said.

"Yes, Daryl?"

"I think I'm gonna eat my boot in a minute." He said.

Carol smiled. "OK, Daryl, I'll make you some breakfast. It won't be hot, because I don't want to risk starting a fire, but it'll be better than your boot." Daryl got up and helped Carol up.

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"I think it's a solid plan." Glenn said. Carol had called them all together to eat what she had thrown together out of the canned goods they had. They were all sitting around eating and Daryl had revealed to them what he thought they should do.

"It's certainly better than anything we've heard so far." Maggie said.

Daryl was feeling proud of himself. The whole group seemed to not only be behind what he thought was best, but they actually seemed a little uplifted by it.

Michonne was proud of Daryl and she could see on his face that he was proud of himself. She was leaning against the wall, a little embarrassed that Daryl was feeding her bites of food at intervals. Her muscles were so tired and sore that when she'd tried to lift the fork, even with her left hand, her arm had shook badly enough to shake most of the food off of her fork.

"It's settled, then." Sasha said. "When Rick and Tyreese get back, we'll fill them in."

"Do you think Rick's gonna go for it?" Beth asked. She wondered if Rick was going to be mad that they'd all agreed on this without him, and maybe even that it hadn't been his idea. Rick didn't like to have things questioned, and Daryl's plan sort of suggested that Rick's had fallen short of the mark.

The thing that comforted Carol the most was that Daryl had answered a question for them that none of them had been given an answer to before. Rick's plan involved them going _somewhere_, but Rick had never really answered where they were going or how long it would take to get there. Daryl was offering them that, at least to the best degree that he could. He had given them a destination, and it felt like a goal that they could actually achieve.

"Rick don't always gotta have the last word." Daryl said.

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"So it's simple. We're scavengers now, so basically we're fine anywhere that we've got places to scavenge from. So we're gonna go until we've gone through about three towns. Then we find a place to hole up for the winter while clean out the surrounding area. Then we get up and go again until we get to another place to stop."

"I like it." Tyreese said. "It makes sense." The whole group had agreed.

"I don't think we're going to find another prison, but we might find something like a gated community." Glenn said. "We could make that safe."

"Sort of like our own Woodbury." Maggie said.

"We could maybe even have our own houses and all." Rachel said.

"A little privacy would be nice." Glenn added.

Rick couldn't really see any problem with the plan. In his mind he had seen them covering more ground than Daryl was suggesting, instead of sort of squatting in intervals, but he couldn't really see any flaw in the plan as long as they managed to find somewhere they could be protected for at least a little while. The whole group was behind the plan, so they would try it out and see if it worked. That was the best they could do.


	29. Chapter 29

"I think it'll work out. We'll move on in a couple of days and then we'll figure out where we want to stay." Tyreese said.

"Where do you think we'll stay?" Sasha asked.

"Someone said a gated community that we could turn into something like Woodbury." Josh said. "Do you think we could find one safe enough?"

"We could certainly _make_ one safe enough." Tyreese said. "I'd been thinking a hotel might work too. You know, we could board up the doors downstairs. Even better if it had a fenced in pool area or something because Carol could use it for cooking and not have to worry too much. We could sleep on the second floor. Walkers can't climb stairs very well, and they can't unlock doors, so we could lock the doors to the stairwells on the first floor at night and we wouldn't have to worry about Walker surprises while we sleep."

"You know, that could be a good idea if we could find a place like that." Sasha said.

"I'll suggest it to Daryl in the morning." Tyreese said.

Their group of four had chosen to take over a space in the back of the barn. The four of them, the four Woodbury people, since Rachel slept with Rick. Rachel wasn't really a part of either group. When Rick wanted her around, she was allowed access into the prison group, but when he didn't seem in the mood for her, she was put back into the Woodbury group. That's how it felt to Tyreese. He heard them all talking about "the group" all the time and what was best for "the group", but Tyreese thought everyone failed to notice that they weren't really one group, they were two groups.

Some of the prison group was nice, and Tyreese felt that many of them would open their arms entirely and integrate the Woodbury group entirely, thus really making this one group, but Rick had never fully allowed it. He'd said they were welcome, he called them part of the group, but there was a pretty clear dividing line, especially when it came to discussing the future or making decisions. They ate together, they worked together, and when the rare opportunity arose they played together, but Rick rarely seemed to care at all what any of them thought about things or how they saw things playing out in this situation.

Daryl might be different. Daryl was a simple man, but he seemed like a pretty fair and reasonable man. He also wasn't a man that was afraid to accept help or suggestions from others. Rick seemed like he wasn't OK with accepting anything from anyone else, and he wasn't really open to suggestions. If Tyreese talked to Daryl, at least Daryl would listen to him, and maybe they could actually start working together to keep both groups going. Maybe even one day, they could actually become one real, whole group.

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Daryl had been massaging Michonne's shoulders and arms for a long time. She knew his hands had to be throbbing because he kept taking brakes to squeeze at his thumbs. She'd told him a few times that he could stop, but it was clear that he wasn't going to until he was ready. He'd decided that the massages might help with the soreness, and even though it had hurt pretty badly at first, Michonne had to admit that she was enjoying it now.

"Everybody really liked my idea, 'Chonne." Daryl whispered. Though he didn't see it, she smiled. Daryl was so proud of himself. Everyone _had_ liked his idea, and it had surprised him that the group had unanimously agreed it was the best way to move forward.

"Of course they did." Michonne whispered back. "It's because you're such a smart man."

"Nah, I ain't smart 'Chonne. I ain't hardly got no learnin'. I quit school when I was a kid." Daryl said.

Michonne knew that Daryl lacked almost all self-confidence. It was fairly clear. She also knew that he wasn't textbook smart. She wasn't sure what Daryl's reading level was, but she thought it probably wasn't very high. She knew he counted on his fingers. There were a lot of things that Daryl didn't know; that was for sure. She wasn't exactly waiting for him to woo her with any Shakespearean sonnets.

But Daryl _was_ a smart man when it came to the things that he knew, and one of those things was strategy. Daryl was a pretty good problem solver. Sometimes he needed a little help along the way, but he could work his way through most things. Michonne had seen it herself in regular situations all the time. Daryl might not think the highest thoughts, but Daryl was a thinker and he did well moving from one point to another as he considered something. He hadn't actually figured out any way to _solve_ all their problems, but he had made a pretty good start. It was possible that there was no solution, but if there was, Michonne was fairly confident that given enough time Daryl would arrive at it.

"You are smart, Daryl. You don't have to know things out of books to be smart. You know life things, and you've already answered a lot of questions about our future for us. They were questions we couldn't answer, so that's pretty smart, I'd say." Michonne said.

Daryl didn't respond. He worked her shoulders for another minute and then it was obvious to Michonne, by the hand that he reached around to her breast and by his nibbling at her neck, that Daryl wanted to engage in other activities. He made her shiver, nibbling the spot on her neck that he had learned always got a reaction.

Michonne wasn't really in the mood, but she appreciated the significance of this. Daryl didn't seem concerned that everyone would hear them, or maybe even see them. They didn't even have the protection of the prison walls here. He also hadn't asked her if she felt like it, and usually he asked before he made any move at all to initiate a coupling.

Michonne didn't say anything, but she did lie down and position herself in a way that told Daryl she was fine with his proposal. As he moved into position and entered her, she whispered "Don't worry about me."

Daryl knew, because she had explained it to him, that Michonne sometimes wasn't in the mood to concentrate on sex, but that didn't mean she didn't enjoy herself. When she told him not to worry, he wasn't supposed to focus on her, just let her be along for the ride. Daryl knew, though, that she usually finished the trip with him, even if he wasn't worried about her.

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"I think it's a good idea. I mean it makes sense and that way we have an outside too." Daryl said. He was standing over Michonne telling her about what Tyreese had said about adding a hotel as another possible option for long term cover, depending on where they stopped and what they could find. She was sitting on the pallet feeding Hope, her arms feeling much better than they had the day before.

Rick had been stomping and snorting all morning. He came in through the door of the barn, closing it behind him and stomped over to Daryl, slamming something into his chest and taking Daryl completely off-guard.

"If you're going to keep fucking her, be smart about it and at least use condoms. We don't need Fertile Myrtle here having more kids to get the rest of our group picked off." Rick growled.

"Don't you ever fucking talk about her like that again!" Daryl yelled, grabbing Rick by the shirt and raring back like he was going to hit him.

Daryl's reaction surprised Michonne and it must have surprised Daryl too, because he lowered his arm, but he didn't let go of Rick's shirt for a minute. The two of them just stared at each other. Finally, Daryl let go of Rick's shirt and Rick stomped away.

"I'm sorry 'bout that." Daryl said after a minute. He dropped the box of condoms on the pallet.

"Don't worry about it." Michonne said. It was obvious he was worrying about it, though.

"Here…" Michonne said, offering him Hope. "She's done. Why don't you take her on a walk around the barn?" Walking always helped Daryl when he was worried about something.

Daryl took the baby and kissed her. He smiled at her for a minute before starting his tour around the barn.

Michonne knew Rick disliked her. She was pretty sure he even hated her, but she didn't really know _why_ he hated her. She was going to ask him one day, just so she could understand. The thing about Merle had been that he had hated her, but at least she'd known why. For a moment she wondered what Merle would think about his baby brother who was pacing around an old barn cooing at Hope.

Michonne couldn't figure Rick out, as much as she tried. She didn't know too much about him. She did know, however, that somewhere along the line Rick's train had clearly derailed. She remembered that her father used to say that some people "had gone off their rocker". Rick had clearly gone off his.

_He stuck his finger in my bullet hole_. She thought. When she'd first arrived at the prison, wounded, Rick had been interrogating her. She could understand that he was leery of people, she could understand that completely, but he had stuck his finger in her wound to prod her on when he'd felt she hadn't responded quickly enough. Even if she didn't trust someone, she would not have prodded at their wounds for any reason unless it could be to their benefit.

He had blamed her for the entire Governor escapade, forgetting that she wasn't exactly the president of the Governor's fan club. He had been angry with her for getting pregnant with Hope, even though Judith was another clear example of the fact that accidents happen. Now he was blaming her, or blaming Hope, for Hershel's death, and even if he blamed Hope that came back to her since he had acted like the entire thing was some kind of conspiracy that she'd come up with.

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Daryl couldn't understand Rick. Rick had never explained to him why he didn't like Michonne, and as far as Daryl knew, she'd never done anything to him. In the beginning he had understood it completely, they didn't know her and they didn't know if she could be trusted. That was just using good common sense not warm up too quickly to her, especially since she wasn't a very open and inviting person anyway, but now Daryl couldn't understand it.

He looked down at Hope, rubbing her cheek a little. She was sleeping. He lifted her up and kissed her, nuzzling her cheek with his nose. Her breathe always smelled sweet, like Michonne's milk, after she ate. Daryl liked the smell. She smacked her lips a little, but didn't wake up.

Now they knew Michonne. Though Daryl didn't know everything about, just like he didn't know everything about Rick, he knew enough. The whole group knew enough. Michonne, though she could never be described as _chatty_, had opened up to all of them that were kind to her. Sometimes Daryl would even tease her about it saying that he was jealous because now she gave his smiles out pretty freely, and they weren't the same prize they had been before, though they really still were a prize to him, even if they came more often. As far as Daryl could tell, the only person that Michonne didn't get along with was Rick.

It made him mad that Rick called her names and talked bad about her. Daryl already knew that Michonne felt a little guilty about Hershel's death, even though it was ridiculous for her to feel that way, and Rick didn't need to go insinuating that she had had anything to do with it.

He looked at the baby again. Stopping his pacing again to rub one of her tiny hands. It could have happened anytime. Sure, she'd been crying but that was because Rick hadn't told them to stop. Michonne had told Daryl later that she knew they needed to stop a long time before because if she didn't feed Hope on time then it was painful for her. She told him the only reason that she hadn't told him about it was because she knew how dangerous it could be and she had hoped she could just hold out until they got somewhere.

_She cried. She's a baby, and she was hungry, and she cried. That didn't make her responsible for anything. _

Eventually Rick was going to push him too far, and Daryl didn't want that to happen. He wished he could just tell Rick to get over whatever problem he had, but Rick wouldn't listen to him anyway.

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Of course the confrontation between the two men had not been missed by anyone. When you live in one space together, no matter how large that space may be, no one is going to miss something like that. Carol was sitting on her pallet reading a book that she'd read about twenty times but really liked. She'd looked up when Rick had come stomping in the door, knowing that Rick's stomping could almost always indicate some kind of trouble brewing, and had seen the entire interaction. She was close enough to them that she hadn't missed a word of it.

If Rick caused Daryl to snap then there would likely be a fight, and Carol wasn't sure what the outcome of something like that could be. She was certain, though, that when it came to Michonne or Hope, Rick would do better not to prod at Daryl.

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"Do you think he would act like that if I got pregnant?" Maggie asked Glenn. She had heard Daryl's reaction, but she hadn't heard what prompted it, so she'd been rolling around possible things that Rick might have said while she waited for Glenn to get back to the loft with the crackers he'd gone to get. He'd just filled her in.

"I don't know." Glenn said, stopping to chew a bite of the stale cracker. "I think it's just a Michonne thing."

"What's he got against Michonne?" Maggie asked. She'd come to really like Michonne. Michonne was pretty quiet, but when she did talk, she had a good sense of humor.

"Don't know that either." Glenn said.

"You know, if Daryl's plan works out, having babies might not be a bad thing anymore." Maggie said. "I mean life won't be what it was, but it could be pretty normal. It would just be seasonal."

"Yeah, I mean if we move like he says we're going to move then it shouldn't take too long to get to our next place. If someone were pregnant we could definitely do without them while we cleaned up our little space and got settled in." Glenn responded.

"There are seldom enough Walkers in a pack that we couldn't stand to be less one person for a cleanup job…especially not in a small space. It's not like we're going in to clean up the entire town at once." Maggie said.

Maggie couldn't explain how she felt right now. She was aching on the inside for the loss of her father, and she still half expected to hear him right now chatting with Carol down on the ground. In fact, when she closed her eyes, she _could_ still hear him chatting with Carol and laughing, one of the familiar sounds of the prison. He had spent most of his time with Carol while she cooked or washed clothes, and it seemed like they had never run out of things to say to each other. Maggie missed him…but she understood why he had done what he did. Carol told her that he had said that he was ready and that he'd seen enough death. Maggie could understand that. They'd all seen enough death and they were likely to see more. He hadn't wanted to add to the death toll and he wouldn't have survived anyway if Michonne had gone down.

The thought made Maggie even sadder for a moment. She glanced down below and thought that the barn could have been a lot emptier today. She knew he did what he felt he had to do and what would be best for them all.

Glenn, noticing a few tears from Maggie's eyes, reached over and wiped them.

"Hey…" He said, "We're going to make it." He didn't know if she was crying for Hershel or crying because she was afraid of what was coming, but he felt optimistic. Glenn always _tried_ to be optimistic, but right now he actually _felt_ optimistic. He could see the possibility of a future, maybe even a family, and a different, but somewhat normal, life ahead of them.


	30. Chapter 30

AN: Ok. The review voting Rick off the island cracked me up, I just have to say. Walking Dead Survivor Show: "Rick, you are off the island." LOL That could be funny.

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"The next town over will be a good town to stop in." Michonne said to Daryl. He was sitting next to her rocking Hope, who having eaten, had shown very little interest in going back to sleep. They were in a little farmhouse of sorts, and though it was pretty cramped, they'd managed to get a small room to themselves. Carol had given them the bed and was sleeping on a pallet on the floor with Judith.

"How do you know?" Daryl asked.

The scenery had been getting more and more familiar to Michonne and as she retraced her steps, she got a strange feeling in the pit of her stomach.

"Because I used to live in the one right after it." Michonne said. "It'll be good to stop in and I know there's a nice gated community there. It was where all the well to do people lived."

"We'll be there by tomorrow." Daryl said. "I hope it ain't too bad."

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Daryl had followed Michonne's directions and they found the gated community. Daryl stopped outside of it and got off his bike. The town hadn't looked to overrun, at least not the part they had seen of it, and he could see some Walkers rambling around inside the gate, but right now it didn't look like too much to be worried about. He went from car to car telling the women to stay inside the cars with the kids, at least until they got inside the gates and got the Walkers they could see down. Tyreese, Rick, and Glenn went with him.

"You reckon the gates gonna be locked?" Daryl said as they were walking.

"Doubt it." Glenn said. "Most of the time these gates were electrical. No electricity means no locks." Glenn had spent a fair amount of time passing in and out of various types of gates, so when Daryl looked at him with curiosity he shrugged his shoulders and said "Rich people loved the hell out of some pizza."

Daryl laughed. When they reached the gates, they were glad to find that Glenn's prediction was correct. Rick and Daryl pulled the iron double gates open and Glenn and Tyreese picked off the Walkers that were coming toward them with the machete and hatchet that Daryl had given them. They had decided not to use guns outside if they could avoid it, wanting to draw as little attention to themselves as possible. It would be getting dark soon and they didn't want a herd forming.

"We'll pull in and take that first house." Daryl said pointing to a close house. "We'll clean it out for the night, and then tomorrow we can worry about checking out the security of the place and cleaning up the rest of the Walkers that are in here."

No one said anything, but they did turn and start back to the cars.

When the cars were parked, and the gates were closed, everyone piled out of them. Daryl took Tyreese and went into the house first. There were no immediate Walkers, so Glenn, Maggie, Carol and Michonne stepped in behind them while the others were busy getting together just what they would need for the night. The rest could be unpacked later.

"Do you think there are any in here?" Carol asked, clutching her knife just in case.

"I dunno." Daryl said. The kitchen had been empty, and now they crossing the entry hall into the living room.

"There's a dead one." Daryl said. In response, ambling down the hallway, came another. Daryl quickly took it down.

"Looks like it might have been a couple." Glenn said. "Probably he turned first and she killed him but was bit."

"Let me guess, you used to watch a lot of crime shows." Rick said. Glenn snorted.

"Actually, I did."

"Oh shit." Michonne mumbled. She had her hand on her mouth when everyone turned to look at her. "Somewhere there's a baby."

"Why you say that?" Daryl asked.

Michonne pointed at the coffee table. "Baby proofed." She said. "And there's a baby gate at the bottom of the stairs."

It was obvious from the look on Michonne's face that she didn't want to find it. Daryl didn't really want to see what they would find either.

"I'll find it." Tyreese said. He didn't really like the idea of looking for what he was going in search of, and he didn't really want to imagine what he might find, but he didn't think that women should have to do that, and he didn't think that Daryl, as a new father who doted very much on his baby, should have to do it either. They might run into it at some point, but not tonight. Tyreese looked at his hatchet for a minute.

"Here." Michonne said. She unsheated her katana and held it out to Tyreese. "You won't have to get so close."

Tyreese thanked her, took the katana, and put the hatchet back in his belt. He finished searching the downstairs and the group watched him as he started upstairs.

Daryl had never seen Michonne offer her katana to anyone before. The rest of them shared weapons, but she only allowed you to touch her katana if you were carrying it for her or just moving it from one place to the next.

It seemed like Tyreese was gone a long time. When he finally reappeared, coming down the stairs with the katana in his left hand, he was carrying a bundle, which he put on the floor.

"I didn't think no one wanted to see." He said. "So I found a blanket." He handed Michonne her katana and thanked her again. She sheathed it, looking at the bundle. They'd never treated a Walker with respect before. She didn't know if the baby had turned or not, Tyreese offered no description of what he'd just had to do.

"Let's take 'em outside. We can burn 'em tomorrow after we've done some more clean up." Daryl said. "Carol, can you start gettin' us somethin' for dinner? No fire, so it'll have to be somethin' cold."

"Sure." Carol said, passing Judith to Beth, who had come in behind them.

Once the Walkers were outside and the supplies they needed were inside, it didn't take long for Carol to make dinner and serve it to them at the dining room table.

"So what now, Daryl? Since you seem to be Mr. Got It All Together, is this your master plan? We all stay crammed in this house like the Waltons?" Rick said.

"For tonight we do." Daryl said. "Tomorrow Glenn and Maggie are going to get some chain. That gate's heavy, but not being chained makes it pretty easy to get into if enough Walkers decide they want in. You, me, Tyreese, and Josh are going to check the fences all around to see if any of them are down. The lovely ladies can start cleaning the streets of Walkers. I reckon we'll go from there to see if it's a good place to stay."

"The fences all looked to be made out of iron bars, so that's promising." Tyreese said.

"And tonight?" Rick asked.

"Tonight everybody gets some sleep however they can." Glenn answered. "I, for one, think we need to be ready to hustle tomorrow. The more we hustle, the sooner we can stop living like the Waltons."

"Hear, hear!" Said Maggie.

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The next morning Glenn and Maggie left with instructions from Michonne on how to find the hardware store.

Daryl, Tyreese, Josh, and Rick, started their tour of the community, which was rather large, looking for any problems that might allow a Walker to get through or a herd to push down the fence.

Michonne took Sasha, Maggie, and Beth out to start cleaning up the Walkers that were roaming the streets. Rachel stayed with Carol to care for the babies and get things organized that they would be needing. Beth had wanted to stay behind, but Michonne thought she needed a little more experience with Walker killing. They had had quite the discussion about her weapon.

"I don't want to get close to them." Beth said.

"Take the hatchet. You won't have to get as close to them as someone like Beth or Carol who prefer knives."

"That's easy for you to say. You've got a six inch weapon." Beth argued.

"I can also kill a Walker with a screwdriver if that's what's handy." Michonne said. "Take the hatchet."

"I'd rather have the ax." Beth said. "It's longer."

"And it's heavier." Michonne said. "I don't think you realize how tired you'd get if an ax were your weapon of choice. Take the hatchet."

Beth picked up the hatchet reluctantly. Michonne smiled at her.

"Tell you what, prove to me that you're good with the hatchet, and I'll make sure we find you a katana." Michonne said.

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"I tell you what, that katana don't weigh much, but I got to admit that I don't think I'd want to be swinging it all day." Tyreese said to Daryl as they were walking. "Michonne's got a lot of stamina."

Daryl smiled. "That's 'cause 'Chonne's a hawse." He said.

Tyreese had had a bit of a crush on Michonne since he had first seen her. He'd thought about approaching her, but he had never quite figured out how he would do it or if she was even interested in men. It really didn't seem like she had much interest, so he had become pretty sure that she was a lesbian. He had decided, though, that he was going to give it a shot. That was right before they all found out that Daryl had beat him to the punch. He had to wonder how a guy like Daryl had ended up with her. They didn't seem like they would work together, they were really like the definition of the odd couple, but they did work together. Tyreese had no doubt that he'd lost out entirely. They'd each found the yin to their yang.

Romantic prospect aside, though, Tyreese had a lot of respect for Michonne. She was a formidable woman. He had a lot of respect for Daryl too. When he'd first met Daryl he'd thought "Oh great, some dumb hillbilly that's going to give Sasha and me a world of shit," but that hadn't been the case at all.

"So what's the deal, Daryl? Are we just going to hang out here playing house?" Rick asked.

"We have six towns around us that we can get to pretty easily to pick clean. We can siphon gas from all the cars we see, so that won't be a problem. Michonne said there's some creeks not too far from here. It'll be a longer walk, but it's doable if we take turns going for water. We can stay here a while, Rick. We'll have to move on eventually, but that gives us time to think about things and see how we want to change our plans." Daryl said.

"We're never going to get anywhere moving at this pace." Rick said.

"Where were we going, Rick? We were going nowhere. If we don't have a destination we're not going nowhere, so what does it matter how long it takes us to get to nowhere. This is just our lives now. We're at the end of the world, there's nothing left to do but try to live when we can and learn to just somehow accept what we have." Daryl said.

"That's easy for you to say. You like playing house right now. I hope you remember your oh so wise words when some Walker rips Michonne's throat out and you don't _want_ to accept what you _have_ anymore." Rick said.

Tyreese wasn't expecting what came next, and neither was Josh. "Fuck you, man!" Daryl had yelled, lunging at Rick, punching him in the face. The two fell to the ground and rolled around fighting with one another. Tyreese and Josh found themselves backing up a little, neither attempting to intervene in any way.

Daryl had never been the one to throw a first punch at anyone in his life. He didn't believe in violence unless it was necessary. Right now he felt like it was necessary. He was a little afraid of the fact that he wanted to kill Rick right now. They fought for a while, each getting the better of the other, until finally Daryl got Rick pinned, choking him just enough to render him weak, but not kill him.

"Is that your fuckin' problem, Rick? Are you fuckin' pissed at me 'cause I got 'Chonne and you don't have Lori?" Daryl yelled at him. Rick didn't answer. "Say? Is that your fuckin' problem? I'm gettin' tired of your shit, Rick, so tell me what the fuck is your fuckin' problem 'cause I ain't gonna fuckin' deal with it no damn more!" Daryl started to calm down a bit, but he didn't let up on Rick at all. Rick didn't answer him, but something in his face said that Daryl might have hit somewhere near the mark. "Listen…" Daryl said a little calmer than before, "I know you're pissed that Lori's dead and I get that, man, but hatin' 'Chonne ain't gon bring her back. It wouldn'ta brought her back if you'd given 'Chonne to the Governor, it wouldn'ta brought her back if 'Chonne had died the same way she did, and it wouldn'ta brought her back if 'Chonne had gotten killed the other night right alongside Hershel. Ain't nothin' gonna bring her back. You wanna be pissed about that, then be pissed about it, but take it up with who it concerns, and that's maybe Lori or maybe God, but it ain't 'Chonne. Fuck you man, you don't fuckin' want me to be happy 'cause it reminds you of what you ain't got? 'Cause that's a load of shit! I ain't never had nothin' in my fuckin' life before and just 'cause I got somethin' now and you don't got the same damn thing you want me to lose that? If I lost 'Chonne it wouldn't make you no damn happier than you are right now. You still got a lot of shit right now, man. You still got Carl, and if you'd open your fuckin' eyes you'd know you still got Lil' Asskicker. You got all of us that are tryin' to make this shit work. Stop fuckin' feelin' sorry for yourself, but if you can't stop feelin' sorry for yourself then realize that's your fuckin' problem and not 'Chonne's."

Rick didn't respond at all. He had also stopped fighting. Tyreese decided he should intervene at this point.

"Daryl, let him up." He said, walking over. "I don't think he's going to say anything else."

Daryl responded to Tyreese and got up, off of Rick. Rick sat there a minute, brooding. Daryl thought he might have hit the right spot.

Rick got up, wiping some of the blood that was dripping from his nose.

"Maybe you should go back to the house." Tyreese said to him. "We can finish checking the parameters.

"Hell no!" Daryl said. "I don't want him no fuckin' where 'round my wife or my kid 'til I know he ain't bat shit crazy."

"I'll go with him." Josh offered. "I'll make sure nothing happens."

"I'm not going to do anything to anyone." Rick said. He turned around and headed back toward the house. Daryl looked at Josh and Josh quickly trotted behind him without a word.

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It had taken Daryl a while to simmer down, but when he finally did, he was able to finish the walk with Tyreese. They'd found one problem area. In one corner of the fences the brick section was down a little.

"I think we can fix it, but we'll need to send Glenn and Maggie out tomorrow for brick and cement." Daryl said. "I did some odd construction jobs in the past."

"We can fix it. I did some odd jobs in high school and a lot were brick laying. I don't think it's that big of a deal anyway, because I don't think a Walker could get over it, but we can fix it tomorrow, just in case." Tyreese said.

All in all, they were satisfied that they had found a pretty good location to set up camp…at least until they had to move on, and they had bought themselves some time to think about the next leg of their journey.


	31. Chapter 31

AN: On a reread of the previous chapter, I found out that Maggie is magical and can be in two places at once. What a special girl! Whoops. Sorry about that. Maggie went with Glenn and Michonne took the other women with her (meaning it should have been *Brenda* that went with her)…that's how we shall proceed from here. Sorry again.

On another note, thank you for your reviews. It's very interesting to see people's reactions and to know that you're invested in the story. It's also funny to see what people get hung up on or to see them notice things that I really didn't even think about when I wrote them. LOL

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When Rick had gotten back to the house, it had been pretty obvious that there had been some kind of fight. He hadn't said anything, but Rachel had gone with him to clean up his face. Carol had a pretty good suspicion that it had been Daryl. She wondered how long it would be before Daryl would get back, needing her to clean up whatever he had suffered in the altercation. It must have been Rick that started the fight. Daryl didn't have a violent bone in his body when he wasn't provoked.

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"Ok, there's another one. Everyone get back." Michonne said, looking at the Walker ambling toward them. "Alright, Beth, here's your chance. Remember, no hesitation. Go to it and don't think about it, just take it down." Michonne took out her katana and stood behind Beth, just in case. Beth froze. As it got closer, she flinched and Michonne cleaved its skull. "You hesitated." She said, frowning.

"I'm sorry…" Beth said. She was almost in tears. They'd been doing this for a while and so far out of the pile that they'd taken out already, Beth hadn't killed a single one.

Michonne wasn't mad at Beth. She understood that up close Walker encounters weren't the most comfortable experience in the world, but the more you did it, the less it bothered you.

"You have to just not think about it." Michonne said. "Think about them as what they are. They're completely stupid animated piles of rotting flesh. You're smarter than they are and you're quicker than they are. All you have to do is whack them with a hatchet and you're home free."

"They could bite me." Beth said. "Or scratch me first." She looked absolutely terrified.

"Not if you get to them first." Michonne said.

Sasha and Brenda wandered off to take care of some more Walkers, confident that Beth would be safe as long as she was with Michonne.

Michonne thought about it a little longer. She had to figure out a way to motivate Beth. She had confidence that Beth _could_ do this, but she needed something that outweighed her fear. She needed something that would keep her from hesitating. Something that would drive her to kill Walkers. Michonne considered her own drive. Her first kills were with a kitchen knife, before she'd found her katana. The very first ones had been driven by the need to get to her little girls. Her need to get out of that situation and get to them. Alone she had killed Walkers out of necessity to survive, but also out of anger…anger for what they had done to her daughters. She had killed them to protect Andrea…now she killed them to protect her family. She was motivated by loss, by what she had lost and by what she couldn't stand to lose now.

"Who do you love most in the group, Beth?" Michonne asked. Beth looked confused for a moment, then thoughtful.

"Maggie, I guess." She stuttered.

"What would your life be like if you didn't have Maggie anymore?" Michonne asked.

The look that crossed Beth's face hurt Michonne a little, but she could tell that she'd struck something.

"I don't know." Beth said. "I never thought about it before."

Michonne hated to dig around in fresh wounds, but she knew the stronger the reaction she got from Beth, the stronger the fire would be that would fuel her to face her fear.

"What about your father? Do you wish that you could have saved him?" Michonne asked.

Beth looked struck. "Well of course I do." There were tears welling up in her eyes.

"What if you saw Beth in the same situation? Would you want to save her?" Michonne prodded. She tried to keep her face as blank as possible, not ready yet to let Beth know that she was truly sorry for what she was putting her through right now.

Beth looked a little confused. "Of course I would." She said.

"Every one of these nasty assholes has the potential to take Maggie away from you. Every one that you hesitate to kill has the potential to kill Maggie. Every hesitation on your part means the possibility that you never see Maggie again, and that you have to see her go through what your father went through. But everyone you kill is a step toward saving Maggie. It's your effort to protect her and to make sure that nothing happens to her." Michonne said.

There was another Walker that was coming, drawn by their conversation no doubt.

"Give me the hatchet." Michonne said, holding out her hand. Beth handed it to her. "Like this, Beth." Michonne ran at the Walker and slammed the hatchet through its skull, letting it crumple in front of her as she yanked the hatchet back out. She walked back to Beth and handed her the hatchet.

"There's another over there." Michonne said pointing at another Walker that was coming to join the party. "That one's yours. I want you to go kill it, not for yourself. Go kill it for Maggie."

Beth hesitated a moment, staying back, but finally ran forward, taking down the Walker. When she turned around, panting, and walked back, there were tears in her eyes. Michonne didn't say anything at first. She put an arm around and pulled her to her, feeling Beth squeeze her.

"Good job." Michonne said softly.

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The gate was now securely chained. The streets had been cleared of Walkers, and they felt fairly certain that the place was secure. When Tyreese and Daryl had returned back to the house, Carol had cleaned up Daryl's face, the worst of which was a busted lip, but Daryl hadn't offered to tell her what had happened. Rick had gone straight upstairs and hadn't come back down since. Carol and Rachel ventured out shortly after Daryl and Tyreese returned to go and find water, and both were happy that the walk had been an uneventful walk with so few Walker encounters that Rachel could carry two buckets easily and Carol could carry one, and Carol was still able to take down the Walkers they saw without even putting the bucket down. It wasn't as far as they had first thought either, so they were pleased with that.

Daryl had decided that they would not burn Walkers tonight. He wanted to get that place they saw fixed before he chanced a fire the size that they would need. The women had piled up the Walkers they'd killed and the piles were large enough that he thought it best to wait, even though he was fairly certain Walkers couldn't get into the fence on that corner. He had, however, allowed Carol to start a small fire to make dinner and was currently keeping watch while she cooked it.

"So what happened?" Carol asked him.

Carol was the first who had asked him that. Michonne had started to ask him, but he'd seen it on her face that she had a pretty good idea and would just wait until later for him to tell her the story.

"Nothin'." Daryl said. "I just told Rick to get his shit together."

"With your fist? Something had to happen, Daryl. It's not like you to punch people in the face. If it were, you'd have punched him in the face more than a few times by now." Carol said. She knew about violent men, and Daryl wasn't a violent man.

"It don't matter, Carol. I did what I had to do, that's all." Daryl said.

Carol left it alone. Daryl wasn't going to talk about it unless he wanted to talk about it and it was pretty obvious he didn't want to talk about it.

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The air at dinner was tense. Rick was brooding and Daryl was quiet. Everyone was quiet. None of them quite knew what to say or how to get the conversation going.

"So what's the plan for tomorrow?" Tyreese asked Daryl finally.

"Tomorrow Glenn and Maggie get to go back to town. We need quite a few things to patch that place up and add a little extra security to the fence. I think this place is pretty much clear except for all the shut ins. That means that we can start cleaning out the houses, see how many shut in Walkers we got. All the other hands can do that." Daryl said.

"How are we going to go about houses?" Sasha asked. "Any particular order you think we should go in?"

"I figure we use this house as headquarters."

"Headquarters for what?" Rick asked. Everyone seemed a little shocked that he was speaking to Daryl.

"Headquarters for everything, Rick. Common space. We'll leave the living room for anytime we need a group meeting and we can use the rest of the house as storage. Carol can set up a space, if she wants to, to do rations." Daryl said.

"That would be good. I'll clean the kitchen out and use it. Then everyone can bring their boxes once a week and I'll pack them. That can also be where everyone drops off their laundry." Carol said. She was getting excited. It looked like Daryl had been right. The place already felt safe, and it was going to be better than the prison.

"So then tomorrow we clean out houses for everyone. I'd say let's keep them all on this street, but other than that it doesn't really matter. We'll eventually clear out and loot all the houses, but it ain't gotta be a race. We just gotta get enough to live in right now. There's lots to choose from so everybody can have one if they want it." Daryl said.

"It's so exciting!" Maggie said. "We're all going to have our own houses. It'll be like a neighborhood."

"We're all going to have our own beds, that's even better. We'll have couches and chairs, and our own kitchens for things like midnight snacks." Glenn added.

"We can even start cooking our own meals." Rachel said.

"I really don't mind cooking for everyone." Carol said. For a moment it struck her, the idea of all of them living in their own little houses. For so long they'd just shared one space that it was going to seem strange not seeing everyone's face at all hours of the day and night. It was a little exciting, but also a little sad.

"If you want to keep cooking for me, I'm fine with that." Michonne said. "I like not having to worry about what I'm going to eat, it's just there for me."

Carol smiled at her. "I'll keep cooking and whoever wants it can eat it. If anyone wants to cook for their house, just swing by and I'll get you what you need." It looked like she might not loose mealtime altogether. Rachel had seemed like the only one interested in cooking their own meals. Everyone else looked satisfied when she said that she'd continue to cook.

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"Do you want to tell me what happened with Rick?" Michonne asked when they were in bed.

"Not really." Daryl said. "There ain't much to tell. Rick was being an ass."

"So you mean Rick was being Rick and you socked him in the face for it?" Michonne said.

Daryl snickered. "He said some shit about you gettin' tore up by Walkers and I don't know, I just got so pissed I couldn't take it anymore. I just sorta snapped." Daryl said.

"Well of course you did. You like me enough that you don't want to see me get torn up by Walkers." Michonne said.

"You know I don't just like you, 'Chonne." Daryl said, his voice changing octaves a little. "I love you."

Michonne smiled. "I know, Daryl. I was just teasing you. I love you too." She kissed him.

"We're gonna have our own place tomorrow, 'Chonne…our own house." Daryl said.

"Yep, we sure are." Michonne said.

"I didn't even have a house before all this." Daryl said.

"Where did you live?" Michonne asked.

"I lived in a trashy ass single wide on some land my uncle owned." Daryl said. Michonne laughed, trying to picture Daryl in his "trashy ass single wide". "I'm serious, 'Chonne. Damn thing was like a metal shoebox and it smelled like skunk and cat piss." Michonne laughed again.

"Well, our house won't smell like skunk and cat piss, it'll just smell as delightful as everything else around here does." She said. The truth was they had gotten used to the smell around them. You were only aware of it when it was particularly bad, like when you were near a bunch of Walkers or when you burned Walkers.

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Carol had been listening to them talk, snuggled up with Judith on her pallet. She was sad now. She realized how long it had been since she'd heard silence at night when she was trying to sleep. In the prison there were always voices, in the barns and houses on the way here there had always been voices, and here she was already used to falling asleep listening to the end of the day chatting of Daryl and Michonne and the muffled conversations taking place outside their room. She realized that tomorrow night, after they'd cleaned out all the houses, shared conversation while they burned Walkers, and shared dinner together, they'd all be going off to their houses to start their new lives…the lives that they would live for this era…and there would be no more conversations to lull her to sleep like a bedtime story.


	32. Chapter 32

It hadn't taken Maggie and Glenn long to get back with the building supplies. They'd been so excited that they'd left before breakfast. Now Daryl and Tyreese were working on making the fences as secure as they could, starting with building back up the column that was partially down.

"So how long have you been with the group?" Tyreese asked Daryl.

"I don't know man, pretty much since the beginning. They was campin' in the woods and me and my brother come up on 'em. They had another guy, Shane, that was sorta leadin' the group and he convinced us that it made more sense stayin' in a group. We had some meat and they had canned food, so we had us a real good supper that night and figured that it couldn't hurt to hang with 'em for a while." Daryl said.

"So there was someone in charge before Rick? What happened to him?" Tyreese asked.

"Went fool and tried to kill Rick. So Rick got him first." Daryl said.

"So Rick has been with the group longer than you have." Tyreese said. Daryl thought about it a minute.

"Nah, he ain't been with the group longer than me. He come after me and Merle was already there for a good while. But Rick was married to Lori, and she was with the group when I got there. She was with Shane. That's why Shane turned fool, I think." Daryl was quiet for a minute, continuing to work. "It's a shame." He said after a minute.

"What is?" Tyreese asked.

"Well, Shane turned fool 'cause a Lori goin' back to Rick and leavin' him. I guess he felt like Rick took somethin' away from him, even though it wasn't his to start with. Now it looks like Rick's gone fool 'cause Lori died and he don't got her no more. It's hard to understand, really. Lori was one damn annoying bitch. I don't know why either one of 'em would have wanted her bad enough to go fool." Daryl said.

Tyreese laughed. "Must have been some golden pussy." He said. Daryl laughed.

"Musta been." Daryl said.

"Well, maybe he'll start focusing on going from one annoying bitch to another. I don't know if you've noticed, but Rachel isn't exactly who I'd choose to be prime company." Tyreese said.

"I hadn't really noticed." Daryl said. Rachel was, at times, a little too bubbly for his tastes, and she talked way too much, but he hadn't paid her much attention.

"Don't get me wrong, she's not a bad person or anything, but I can't say that out of all the people of Woodbury I would have chosen her for my group. The thing about us is, we weren't really a group at Woodbury. We didn't have the same family type thing that y'all got going on. We just sort of ended up together after everything went down and that's how we got our group." Tyreese said.

"What you mean with all this "our" group "your" group business? Ain't we just a group? 'Cause if we ain't, which group gets credit for fixin' this damn fence?" Daryl asked.

"Well I know we're supposed to be, but I don't think Rick really thinks of us as part of the group." Tyreese said.

"Man I don't give a half a fuck what Rick thinks right now. Until he stops thinking bad shit about Michonne, I ain't listenin' to another damn word that comes outta his mouth. If he told me it was rainin' I'd still go outside to check." Daryl said. He was quiet for a few minutes. "This group's 'bout the only damn family I ever had, and it's a lot better than anything I had before all this shit, so if y'all wanna be part of it and help me make sure that don't nothin' happen to no one, then I got a lot more room for family."

Tyreese felt better. Daryl was a man that he could get behind as a leader. He knew that Daryl did think of this group as his family, and apparently somewhere in there was room for them. Daryl was the kind of man who seemed to feel very strongly about protecting his family, and that meant that the "for the good of the group" meant something when he said it.

"Hey, man, you got yourself a nice family." Tyreese said.

"I sure do, and I plan on keepin' it that way." Daryl said.

"Your little girl, she's pretty." Tyreese offered. Daryl smiled and wiped sweat off his forehead with the back of his arms.

"Yeah she is. She looks like her mama." Daryl said.

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Everyone was hustling around carrying bags and boxes of things back to "Carol's place," what their headquarters had become known as, cleaning out houses, and stacking up Walkers. Michonne started down the street, having taken a break to feed Hope after Carol had called her from down the street. Now she was going to the next house on in the line to handle whatever clean up needed to be done there.

Maggie and Beth saw Michonne coming. They were walking down the middle of the street carrying a crib.

"We got a crib for Hope." Maggie called out. "Did you pick a house yet?"

"No, not yet. Just take it back to Carol's place." Michonne said. "When you got the crib did you see…well…did you see anything?"

"Don't wanna talk about it." Maggie said. Michonne continued on and they took the crib back to Carol's place.

Michonne carefully stepped into another house, looking around cautiously. So far they'd only found one that was empty. It looked like the entire strategy of this neighborhood, when the whole thing hit, was to try and stay inside. Unfortunately it also looked like that hadn't work out for them as well as they had wanted it to. She couldn't figure it out, though, because all the doors were closed, so Walkers hadn't come in and bitten them. At least one member of each household must have been bit outside and brought it in. Surely Glenn would have the puzzle solved for them soon, since he seemed really interested in figuring out what had happened here.

"Not yet." Michonne said. They made their way through the house together. Nothing on the first floor. Michonne went first up the stairs and Beth followed a few steps behind her. When they got up there, they were met by two Walkers. Michonne was impressed, as she took down one, Beth took down the other. "You're getting good at this." Michonne said. Beth was beaming.

"You know, it's not that bad." Beth said. "Do you think that's all in this house?"

"I don't know, let's finish checking it out and then we'll get these two out of here. I hate when they're upstairs, it means you have to carry them farther."

After they checked the rest of the rooms, satisfied the house was clean, they carried the two Walkers out and to the piles that they were forming for burning in the street later.

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When people started breaking from clean up duty, satisfied they had cleaned enough houses for everyone to have one, it was time for everyone to figure out which one they wanted. Maggie was dying over one of them, so everyone unanimously agreed that she should have it because she wanted it so much, describing it as the perfect house. She'd already picked out the bedroom she was going to share with Glenn and she'd let Beth pick out her room. She'd even gone ahead and changed the linens with some clean ones that she found in the closet.

Tyreese let Sasha pick out a house for them. He didn't care which one they were in, so he might as well let her pick. When she selected one, he went in with her to look for sheets to change the beds.

Brenda also had her heart set on one particular house, so no one minded when she and Josh claimed it.

Rachel picked a house for her and Rick and Carl to share. When they went in to start getting things ready, Carol knew for sure what she'd already suspected. She had inherited Judith. It didn't matter, though. She was fond of her and at this point she was thankful to have her. She got Tyreese to help her move the crib to one of the extra houses, really not caring where she ended up.

Michonne let Daryl pick the house since he'd never had a house before. He picked a nice one with three bedrooms, and Michonne was pleased to see it wasn't too badly decorated. Together they moved the crib into the room that Daryl had decided would be Hope's room. He wanted a rocking chair for that room too, and she promised that they'd try to find one. She thought she had seen one in the house that Brenda and Josh had chosen and she was pretty sure that she could talk them into parting with it.

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"We got us a house, 'Chonne." Daryl said, lying in bed and watching as Michonne finished sponging off and started drying off in the bathroom that connected to their bedroom. "And we got us a big bed with sheets and more pillows than I ever seen in my life."

Michonne had to admit that she had done a pretty good job fixing up the bed with the linens she found. It did have a lot of pillows, but she had been excited about all the pillows that she'd found. Maybe she'd overdone it, but right now it looked like it was going to feel like sleeping on a cloud. After dinner everyone had headed to their houses to call it an early night.

"I hope you washed off good before you got in that bed, Daryl. You were smelling pretty ripe at dinner." Michonne said.

"I bathed while you were puttin' Hope down, and you weren't exactly smellin' like no daisy yourself." Daryl said. Michonne smiled at him.

"You're right, we do have a nice house, Daryl." She said walking toward him. "And I know what I'd like to do right now." She crawled up on the bed.

"What is that?" Daryl asked, grinning.

"I'd like to test out the mattress and see how it is." She said. She straddled him and he grinned harder, leaning up to kiss her.

"I like when you do that." He said.

"Do what?" She asked, kissing his neck.

"Get all predatory on me." He replied. Michonne laughed.

"Am I predator?" Michonne asked.

"Sometimes you are, and sometimes you're just kinda soft. I like that too. I guess I like most everything about you." Daryl said.

"Mmm…" She kissed him again. "Well how about you show me just how much you like me." She said.

"We can be as loud as we want." Daryl said. "I'm gonna show you how to be the loudest you've ever been before."

He had a sort of devilish grin on his face that Michonne hadn't seen before.

"I'll accept that challenge." She said. "But you're putting Hope back down if we wake her up."

"Deal." Daryl said, pulling her to him.

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Carol couldn't sleep. It was too quiet. She had never felt so alone in her entire life. She'd moved Judith's crib into her room just to have the sound of the sleeping baby, and she was considering moving her into the bed with her.

Everyone else had somebody they could talk to. Judith hadn't started really talking yet, but she made some sounds, all gibberish. Carol was the only one who didn't have anyone. She'd watched sadly as they had all headed into their houses, looking very excited about the prospect of having a home. She didn't have a home. She had a house that had a bed in it and a crib with a baby that wasn't even hers. As much as she really wanted to love Judith and take her as her own, part of her lived in fear that Rick would want her back one day, and Carol had absolutely no real right to the child, so she'd have to give her back. Then she wouldn't have anybody.

Carol tossed and turned for a while. She couldn't do this. She felt like she was going crazy.

_If Hershel were here, he'd have lived with me. He'd have understood that I can't do this anymore. I don't know how to be alone._

After what seemed like hours, Carol got up and got dressed. She got Judith out of her crib, the baby waking up just a little and then falling back asleep against her shoulder. She picked up her knife and she started out the door.

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Daryl was the first to wake up to the sound of pounding on the door. It took him a minute to figure out what the sound was and by that time Michonne was stirring.

"What is it?" Michonne mumbled.

"I don't know." Daryl said. "It sounds like someone beating on the door."

"Maybe something's wrong." She said. Daryl was already up and searching around for his boxer shorts.

"Well I figured that much." He said. "Walkers don't exactly go around knocking on doors like the Avon lady." He heard Michonne snicker.

Daryl got his shorts on and grabbed his crossbow, just in case. He went downstairs and opened the door.

It was Carol, standing on his porch with Lil' Asskicker.

"What the hell?" Daryl asked.

"Please, Daryl, can I stay in the other room? I can't handle the quiet." Carol said. "I didn't know where to go and I can't handle it."

Daryl stared at her for a second. It was obvious from her voice that something was really wrong with her. It was cracking at intervals and sounded shaky.

"You just go trottin' around at night with a baby all by yourself?" Daryl asked.

Carol pulled the knife she was carrying strapped to her leg out of its holster and showed it to him. Then she put it back.

"I had to come by myself, Daryl. There was no one else to come with me." Carol said. Daryl pulled her inside and shut the door.

"Yeah, you can stay with us. You'll need to change the sheets 'cause we ain't done that room. 'Chonne found a bunch of sheets in the closet upstairs." Daryl said.

"Thank you, so much." Carol said. "I'll find them and change the sheets." She whispered.

"Tomorrow I'll get Lil' Asskickers crib." Daryl said.

When they got to the top of the stairs, Daryl bid Carol goodnight.

"Goodnight, Daryl, and don't worry, I promise I won't listen to anything." Carol said, opening the hall closet with the one hand she had free to find some sheets for the bed.

Daryl went in the bedroom without another word. He shut the door and shucked his boxers, coming back to bed and snuggling in beside Michonne.

"It was Carol." Daryl said, hugging her to him.

"I heard." She said.

"I told her she could stay with us. Is that OK with you 'Chonne?" Daryl asked.

"It's just fine with me." Michonne said. She hugged her pillow. She hadn't thought of it before, but it made perfect sense. Carol was alone and no one knew how to be alone anymore. Michonne couldn't imagine what it would feel like to be by herself. All they knew how to do now was to be together. It was only right that Carol not be punished because she wasn't in a couple and she didn't have any biological family left. She deserved to be taken into someone's home, and Michonne was glad that she had felt comfortable enough to choose to knock on their door instead of someone else's. They would be more than happy to share their home with Carol and Judith.


	33. Chapter 33

AN: In response to "Where's Carl?" I'll give everyone a little insight to me here. I develop characters more and more as I get to know them. Carl is a character that I haven't gotten to know yet. I've been playing with him a lot in my mind and trying to figure out how I'm going to take him out of being a flat "extra" and bring him fully into play, but he's just not found his niche yet. That being said, assume that he is there and he's not forgotten about, I'm just not ready to bring him out yet as one of the main characters. I have to feel him out some more. Every dog shall have his day, but today isn't his day…and tomorrow isn't looking good either. LOL

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Over breakfast everyone was smiles. Rachel, Rick, and Carl hadn't joined them, Rachel had decided to cook breakfast at their house. Everyone else was gathered together and looked very well rested. A night in a comfortable bed after what they'd been used to was a treat indeed.

"So, what did you do in your new house last night?" Sasha asked Maggie.

Maggie giggled. "We played."

"You played?" Sasha questioned.

"Yep. We played hide and go seek." Maggie said.

"And tag." Beth added. Everyone laughed.

"It's true." Glenn said. "We played until we all got really tired and then we went to bed.

"And then they played cowboy apparently." Beth said, blushing. "I told them this morning that we had to slide the bed out from the wall."

"We played too." Josh said. "We played tag, at least, but we did it naked."

"That, my man, is knowing what to do with the space you have." Glenn said. Brenda blushed and swatted Josh.

"Michonne, Daryl, what did you guys do?" Maggie asked.

"We are responsible adults." Michonne said. "There was no tag or hide and go seek. We took care of Hope and went to bed."

"Awww, hiss and boo. You're no fun." Maggie said.

"And we tested out the mattress." Daryl said. "Just to make sure it was good quality." Everyone laughed. Daryl blushed and Michonne even felt her own cheeks grow warm. "Tyreese," Daryl said when everyone had calmed down, "do you think you can help me move Lil' Asskickers crib to our house when we get done with breakfast?"

"Sure thing." Tyreese said.

"Carol's going to be living with us." Daryl added.

"Oh, Beth, was it your house that has that beautiful wooden rocking chair in one of the upstairs bedrooms?" Michonne asked.

"Yeah there's one in the room we aren't using." Brenda said.

"Would you be willing to part with it? I'd really love to put it in the nursery." Michonne said.

"Sure, we're not using it." Brenda responded.

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"Beth, come with me." Michonne called to Beth, who was just coming out of another house that they were cleaning out. Beth jogged over. "Let's go over to the next street." Beth followed her.

Michonne walked to the middle of the street.

"Give me your hatchet." Beth handed it to her, and Michonne noticed it was somewhat reluctantly. Michonne unsheathed her katana and handed it to Beth. "If you think you want one, we're going to practice." Michonne said.

Beth held the sword awkwardly and Michonne adjusted her wrist.

"Shouldn't we go in one of these houses and find a Walker?" Beth asked.

"If you think I'm going in a small space with you, Walkers, and my katana your first time out, you're crazy." Michonne said. Beth giggled. Michonne got behind her and tried to position her arm. "Now," Michonne said backing up, "just practice swinging it."

Much to Michonne's surprise, Beth swung the sword awkwardly and then it went flying, clattering along the ground. Michonne went to retrieve it.

"Break my sword and I'm gonna be pissed." Michonne said. "It's not a Louisville Slugger. The first rule of any weapon is to hold on to your weapon."

She picked up the katana and examined it. It was unharmed. She walked back to Beth who looked pretty upset. Michonne was still frowning, but she tried to soften it a little. Maybe the idea of pissing off Michonne was a little too much for Beth.

"Here, try again." Michonne handed Beth the katana again, got behind her, and tried to reposition her arm. Beth was stiff and barely moved when Michonne tried to pull her arm into position. Beth was nervous right now and Michonne wasn't sure if it was her or the katana that was causing it.

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"Sasha, come here." Maggie said, trying to be as quiet as possible and still get Sasha's attention. "You gotta see this, it's the cutest thing ever." Maggie said. Sasha jogged over to where Maggie was, crouched down and hiding behind a brick column, peeking around the side. Maggie immediately grabbed her arm and pointed. A short distance away she could see Beth and Michonne. Michonne was apparently trying to teach Beth to use her katana, and from the looks of it things weren't going great. "I wondered what they were doing when Michonne wanted to see Beth alone." Maggie whispered. "It's been hilarious. I can't hear much, but every time Beth drops the sword, Michonne yells at her and each time she does that, Beth gets a little stiffer. Right now she's made it to moving like a rusty robot. I'm waiting for the full mannequin effect."

Sasha crouched down behind Maggie and watched over her shoulder. It was true. Michonne was trying to move Beth's arms around, but Beth wasn't responding fluidly at all. Her movements were jerky. Michonne looked like she was performing some kind of elaborate dance because every time Beth swung the sword there was no telling where it would go and Michonne was trying to keep from being hacked to death by her own blade flying through the air.

Beth made another bungle and Maggie covered her mouth, trying not to laugh. Sasha did the same, but having been bumped by Maggie, she fell back on the ground, causing them both to try to stifle another laugh. It hadn't seemed to disrupt katana training, but it had gotten the attention of Carol who was passing by carrying a box of things she'd looted out of one of the houses.

"What are y'all doing?" She asked. They shushed her. She walked over to where they were and saw what they were watching. "Get out of there and leave them alone. There are tons of houses that need to be ridded of Walkers and we've only begun going through houses for supplies. There's more than enough work for you to do that you don't need to go spying on other people.

Reluctantly the two got up and, still giggling, headed back to work.

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"Beth, you have to loosen up." Michonne said, frustrated. "You're stiffer than half the Walkers I killed this morning."

Beth had become frozen almost. Entirely inanimate.

"Michonne…" She said timidly. "I don't like this. It feels weird and I don't like it."

"Already attached to your hatchet, huh?" Michonne said. Beth didn't say anything. Michonne took the katana out of her hands and sheathed it. "Hey, it's OK. We all get attached to our weapons. It's good to get attached to them. It means they make you feel safe, and feeling safe means that you probably are safe as long as you have it. I wouldn't want to just work with a knife, but Carol likes her knife more than anything else. I wouldn't want to be stuck in a situation with Daryl's crossbow, but he keeps it by the bed." Michonne said. Beth was just standing there, looking a little uncomfortable. Michonne smiled at her. Beth was sweet, and she was only just finding herself. Losing Hershel had been a new kind of wake up call for her. "Do you want your hatchet back?"

"Yeah." Beth said, taking it back from Michonne.

"Who knows, you may find yourself something you like better later, or you may always carry that hatchet with you. It doesn't matter as long as it gets the job done." Michonne said. They started walking back toward Carol's place to figure out what was next on the to-do list.

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"I'm pretty sure that this place is secure." Daryl said while they were all eating dinner, minus Rick, Rachel, and Carl who had barely come out of their house today, even to work while everyone else scuffled around doing whatever Carol, who had become the keeper of the to-do list, commanded. "Still, we need to come up with some kind of communication system in case something were to happen or someone needed someone. Carol wandering around last night got me worried. I mean if she'd been attacked no one would have known until this morning."

"Well, we can't just call each other anymore." Sasha said.

"Maybe we could." Tyreese said. "What about tin can telephones? We could run them through the windows of the houses and use them to create a kind of call chain."

"Do those things even work?" Josh asked. He'd seen them on television and he'd seen them in movies, but he'd never actually tried one for himself.

"They work, but they're not ideal." Carol said. "Besides, could we be sure that would be enough to even wake somebody up?"

"They could work, and they could always be a plan B idea or an extra step, but we're going to need more than that." Daryl said.

"What about those traffic cone looking speaker things?" Brenda offered. "If everyone had one then they could call for help."

"That's another idea." Daryl said. "But we'd have to find enough of them."

"Air horns?" Sasha threw out.

"Maybe. We could possibly combine them." Daryl said, wrinkling his brow. "I think we need watch too. It's gotta be different than it was at the prison, though. Whoever does it is gonna have to keep spendin' the night circlin' the entire neighborhood, so whoever's on watch at night gets the whole next day to rest and sleep. They'll be tired combinin' not sleepin' with circling the fences."

"Brenda and I'd be happy to take night watch until we figure it out. Both of us are better at stayin' up late at night than we are gettin' up in the morning." Josh offered.

"What about some kind of big drum or a gong or something like that?" Glenn said. Everyone looked at him for a minute. "Knock it off, guys." He said.

"Yeah, we know you're Korean." Daryl said.

"I'm serious, if we got something loud like that we could drag it to the center of our street. At least then there'd be some kind of "everybody up" method we could use to let everyone know at once that something was going on." Glen said.

"You know, that ain't a half bad idea, Glenn." Daryl said. "But where we gonna get somethin' like that?"

"Maggie and I saw one." Glenn replied. Daryl looked at him funny.

"We did, on the way to the hardware store, that's what made him think about it because I thought about it too." Maggie said.

"They're serious." Michonne offered. "There was a restaurant in town that had one out front. It used to be pretty good food."

"Fine." Daryl said. "We'll get it, but the rest of you sleep on it. We need a security system, alarms, and ways to communicate some kind of distress from house to house."

"We'll stay up tonight doing a kind of half watch." Josh offered. "Even though we don't really have a solid plan yet it'll do us good to start getting' conditioned to the idea."

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Back at the house, Carol and Michonne had decided to put Judith's crib in the nursery with Hope.

"I just Hope doesn't wake her up all night." Michonne said. "She still doesn't sleep through the night. She was sitting in the rocking chair feeding Hope and Carol was wiping Judith down and getting her ready for bed. Judith was smiling at her and chewing on her hand.

"She's a good sleeper." Carol said. "I'm worried she's behind, though. She isn't walking, and she babbles, but she doesn't talk."

"How old is she?" Michonne asked.

"I don't know. Do you know how old Hope is?" Carol said.

"Not really." Michonne admitted. "I have a rough idea."

"Well the idea gets rougher the older they get." Carol said.

"So she hasn't even said 'mama' or 'dada' yet?" Michonne asked.

"You know, Michonne, I don't think Judith knows what 'mama' or 'dada' is, so she hasn't said them. We don't say them to her." Carol said. She started dressing the baby.

Michonne felt sorry for Judith for a moment because what Carol had said was true. Despite that she had a father, she didn't have a daddy, and even though it was obvious that Judith loved Carol, she didn't really have a mama either, since Carol never would have dared to tell her to call her that.

Michonne thought about Hope. Hope would know very plainly who her mama was and her daddy was, if nothing happened to either of them. What would Carol be to her? Would she be her aunt or would she just be her Carol? What about Judith? They'd likely grow up as sisters if this was a type of lingering arrangement, and Michonne couldn't imagine they'd go anywhere from here where Carol and Judith weren't part of their household. What would they think of each other as? They'd be the only children around, unless someone else got pregnant or Michonne, herself, had another child.

"Do you think the titles mean anything anymore?" Michonne asked, burping Hope who spit up a little. Carol handed her a rag.

"Titles?" Carol asked, picking Judith up and putting her in her crib.

"You know, like "aunt" and "uncle" and "cousin"…those kinds of things." Michonne said. Carol thought about it a minute.

"Since we're all we've got, I don't guess they do." Carol said.

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"How long do you think we'll stay here?" Michonne asked Daryl when she was finally in bed.

"I don't know, 'Chonne, but it's gonna be a while. Just from the little bit of salvagin' we did today we could stay a while and we ain't even gon through half the houses just inside the fence." Daryl said. "We'll start siphonin' gas out the cars to see what we can get next, but with the towns we can get to I reckon' we'll be here a nice little while."

Michonne hoped they would. This place felt even safer than the prison, and Michonne had to admit that she was pretty fond of their bed. If she'd picked the mattress out herself it couldn't have been more suited to her tastes.

Daryl didn't know why Michonne was suddenly curious about the length of their stay, but he could guess from the little bit that he'd learned about her.

"You can relax, 'Chonne. You got some time to just relax. We'll have to move on eventually, but it ain't for a while." Daryl said. "We're home for a while."

He must have figured out what she was thinking, because she responded by rolling over and kissing him with the kind of long and leisurely kiss that she gave him when she was relaxed and content. He responded to her, pulling her to him and wrapping his legs around her, making sure they were as close to each other as they could possibly get. No matter how long they were here, or where they ended up, he wasn't worried as long as he could plan ahead far enough to make her want to give him those kinds of kisses.


	34. Chapter 34

AN: For those confused by the Michonne/Beth interaction in chapter 32, you're no less confused than me. I don't know how it happened, but a little section got deleted between Michonne's musings and her responding "Not yet" which included Beth having caught up with her to help with the clean out of the house. The "not yet" was in response to Beth asking if she'd seen anything in the one they were currently in. I'm sorry for the deletion and really have no idea why/how it happened.

By the way, I keep mixing up names which is super annoying, but even when I reread to try to proofread it's only after I read it online or after someone points it out that I notice. So sorry.

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"Ain't I gonna look ridiculous, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked. He was holding Hope and Michonne was wrapping her to him.

Hope, who had become much more alert even over the past few days, and was now sleeping less and less, seemed to be enjoying this experience because every time Michonne put her face near her Hope smiled and cooed at her.

"Do I look ridiculous when I'm wearing her?" Michonne asked. She'd started wearing Hope around more often these days. Having finally given the wraps a chance, she and Carol both had discovered that they made it a lot easier to get things done and tend to Hope and Judith. Michonne was only a little disappointed that she, unlike Carol, didn't have the option of strapping the baby to her back due to her katana.

"Well, no." Daryl said. "You're her mama, it looks like you're supposed to have her strapped to you."

"And you're her daddy, and it's just as natural for you to have her strapped to you. It's just that this way you can still use your arms." Michonne said.

It was reasonable to Daryl. Hope was sleeping a lot less during the day now and therefore she was spending less time sleeping and wanted to be with them all more. Throughout the day it was normal to see her change arms time and time again as people took breaks and stole baby kisses.

"Besides, it won't be for too long." Michonne said. "You just have to play kangaroo while I go with Sasha and Carol to get water."

Michonne finished adjusting the wrap and kissed hope who gurgled in response.

"There, you're all set." She said, standing back to look at Daryl. He did look funny, but it was more the fact that he was wearing a very nervous face and still holding the baby awkwardly though he didn't have to anymore. "You can let go of her now, Daryl. She's not going anywhere." Michonne nudged. Daryl didn't look so sure about this suggestion and hesitated. "Daryl, would I tell you to drop our daughter?" Michonne said.

"No." Daryl said. "Are you sure it's tight enough?"

"I promise, Daryl. It's very tight." Michonne said.

"I mean it doesn't feel too tight. I could stand for it to be tighter." Daryl said.

"Daryl, if I wrap it any tighter it's going to crush both of you. It's tight enough. You can let go." Michonne said.

Daryl did let go, hesitantly, and Hope settled into position. Daryl smiled.

"Hey this isn't so bad." He said. "Is this what being pregnant is like 'Chonne?"

"As close as you're going to get." Michonne said. She kissed him and then kissed Hope again. "She's full, so she shouldn't want anything for a while. You should tuck a pacifier into wrap in case she does start to cry. We won't dawdle so we should be back before too long." Michonne said, strapping her katana on her back and getting ready to walk out of their front door.

"Be careful 'Chonne." Daryl said.

"You know I always am." Michonne responded.

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Maggie and Beth were on watch, although Beth was more there for decoration than anything, since she was tending Judith, and they opened the gates to let Michonne, Carol, and Sasha pass through. Just outside, Michonne and Sasha quickly killed the six Walkers that had been showing some interest in the gate all morning.

If they went in groups of three, which they normally did, they were able to carry back four buckets of water at a time. The middle person would carry two buckets and the other two would cover them, carrying only one bucket to allow them to carry their weapon in the other. Michonne liked going with Sasha as her second back up. Sasha had really good reflexes and it didn't seem to faze her to take down a Walker.

"So I was thinking about talking to Daryl about what Hershel had suggested about planting some vegetables and things. We could use a lot of the yards that we're not using for anything and when it starts to warm up we could plant vegetables. You know, the extra food supply could prolong how long we stay here. I used to do some canning, so we could grow more than we need and save it up." Carol said.

"I don't have a problem with it." Michonne said. "I think Daryl will like the idea. Nobody wants to have to move on anywhere else."

"It's really starting to feel safe." Sasha said. "I'm starting to really feel at home. I've even started decorating and I never thought I'd ever be decorating again in my life."

"I know what you mean. Yesterday I found a couch in one of the houses that we cleaned out that I liked better than ours so I got Daryl to help me switch them out. Not too long ago I wouldn't have been able to imagine having a couch, and now I'm being picky about it." Michonne said.

"I like the new couch. It really is nicer than the old one." Carol said.

"To your left." Michonne said. Sasha turned and quickly killed the Walker that was approaching her.

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"Well would you look at that." Glenn said looking over his shoulder at Daryl approaching.

"Y'all need some help?" Daryl asked.

"Daryl, don't look now, but you're growing something." Glenn said.

"Don't make fun of me. Michonne and Carol both went to get water." Daryl said. "Carl already laughed at me."

Glenn and Tyreese were busy hanging wire around the fence for extra protection. It was starting to get chilly at night, so they were trying to prepare for the winter. Rick and Rachel had gone on their first supply run in the town, mostly hoping to see what the pharmacy had since they hadn't even finished cleaning out houses yet and the food supply was already coming together nicely. Plus they wouldn't have to go far for food if they needed it from town. Daryl had asked Carl to work on taking supplies down to Carol's place that he found in the houses they still hadn't cleaned out. There were still quite a few Walker cleared ones that he could go through, so it was a pretty safe job to do alone. The extra layer of wire had been Glenn's idea. Not that any herd that could make it through the bars wouldn't be able to push through the wire, but he figured it added a level of protection to anyone around the fences if they couldn't get so much of their arms through.

"No, Daryl, we won't make fun of you. Can't nobody say Daryl Dixon isn't a good father." Tyreese said. "Jump on in here if you can do it with the baby, but you'll need a pair of work gloves. Glenn got four stitches this morning to teach him that."

"It's true." Glenn said. "I won't try to do this without gloves anymore."

"Well I wouldn'ta thought 'bout tryin' it without gloves in the first place." Daryl said, getting started on a patch of the fence.

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When Michonne, Carol, and Sasha brought the buckets back in, Rachel stepped out of the house that they used as headquarters.

"Hey, gals, come here. Maggie, Beth, you too. It won't take but a minute and nothing is going on out here anyway. I got us a little something at the pharmacy." Rachel called. They all trumped up the stairs and inside to the living room that they considered their meeting room. "Here, look." Rachel said, holding out a bottle to Carol.

"I have no idea what I'm looking at." Carol said taking the bottle.

"It's Depo, it's the birth control shot. I cleaned them out of it and syringes. You just give it to us every three months, or in our case ninety days, and voila! We don't have to worry about finding condoms anymore. I got enough that it should last us a while." Rachel said.

Carol looked at the bottle and read the label. "Well, there are dosing instructions, but I have to admit that I've never given anyone a shot before." She said. "You would be guinea pigs."

"It's not that hard." Rachel said. "I went to nursing school for a while, but I ended up dropping out because science wasn't my thing and I didn't realize how much of it I would have to take. I thought it would just be hands on stuff. I can show you. I already measured them out and got you rubbing alcohol." She said, pointing at the coffee table.

"OK, then, who's first? Maggie? Michonne?" Carol asked.

Maggie saw Michonne back up a little.

"I'll be the guinea pig." Maggie said, shrugging.

"Pants down and you can lean over here." Rachel said pointing to the wall.

"Maggie unbuttoned her pants and followed Rachel." Maggie waited while Rachel was giving instructions to Carol. "Michonne, your face is hilarious. Are you scared?" She paused a minute. "You are, aren't you?" Maggie's musings were interrupted. When Carol was done she buttoned her pants again. She looked at Michonne and started laughing. "Oh my God, this is great! You look terrified! Please tell me you're kidding me right now!"

"Maggie, behave." Carol said.

"What?" Maggie said. "This is seriously hilarious!" She continued laughing. "It's Michonne! I've seen her with stab wounds, I've seen her with gunshot wounds, I've seen her get stitched up, and I've seen her give birth and she looks terrified right now!" Maggie was hardly able to breathe from her laughing. Michonne didn't say anything to her.

Carol swatted at Maggie and Maggie hopped out of her reach.

"Maggie, stop laughing at her. Everybody has phobias. Beth's petrified of wasps and you're terrified of spiders and I've never once heard Michonne laugh at you when you asked her to kill a spider for you." Carol said.

"But it's Michonne!" Maggie repeated, having controlled her laughter for the moment, but looking like she might start again. "It's just a little stick, nothing like anything she's handled without hardly flinching."

"Phobias are irrational. I've seen you drive a screwdriver through a Walker's head, but you can't hit a spider the size of a skittle with your shoe. That's irrational." Carol said. Maggie stopped laughing a minute. "Come on, Michonne. Let's get this over with and you won't have to worry anymore." Carol said. Michonne reluctantly walked over, unbuttoning her pants and Maggie snickered again. "The thing about needle phobias are that they're less about the actual event and more about knowing that something is coming and having to wait for it. Michonne was nervous before her labor pains started up to, but then she handled the labor and birth without any problem." Carol said.

When Carol was done, Michonne buttoned her pants. "I wouldn't say without any problem." She said, rubbing her butt cheek.

"Your turn, Rachel." Carol said. "I would say without any problem. You were pretty stoic most of the time, all things considering. And just now you flinched less than Maggie."

Carol finished with Rachel. Maggie and Beth were sitting on the couch together now, Maggie still fighting not to laugh anymore. Sasha was leaning against the wall watching everything.

"I'm sorry, but your face was hilarious." Maggie said.

"Don't worry, Maggie," Carol started, "you'll be getting a little surprise one of these days and Michonne will get her chance to laugh at you."

Maggie's eyes got big and she stopped laughing. "You wouldn't do that, would you?" She asked.

"Mmm." Sasha said. "Payback's a bitch, that's why I don't laugh at anybody for anything like that. Bad karma."

Then it was Michonne's turn to laugh.

"Oh and Maggie, I'm not killing any more of your eight legged friends." Michonne added.

"But Carol, if it's Michonne I was laughing at then it should be Michonne that would do something. It's not fair if you do it." Maggie said.

"I don't really like spiders. I just killed them for you because I knew how scared you were of them. Carol is the spider whisperer." Michonne said.

"You wouldn't really do that, would you, Carol?" Maggie asked, looking very worried.

Carol just smiled. Michonne smiled at her. "So, Maggie, I guess that's what my face looked like. It is pretty funny."

"I guess I'll get Brenda when she gets up for dinner." Carol said. She made no response to Maggie's worrying.

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Michonne and Sasha went to help get wire up. Michonne approached Daryl as soon as she got there.

"How did you two make out while I was gone?" She asked. Hope smiled, dropping the pacifier that had been in her mouth.

"She sure knows your voice." Daryl said. Hope was starting to cry and Michonne was trying to get her out of the wrap.

"Of course she does, I'm the one with the food." Michonne said.

"You know it's more than that." Daryl said. "She was gettin' kinda cranky, though. I changed her diaper earlier, but I told her I ain't had nothin' to give her to eat on but that pacifier."

Having freed her, Michonne offered Hope what she wanted and the baby immediately went to greedily sucking.

"Well, now she'll be good to go." Michonne said. Daryl went back to working. "Where's Rick?" She asked.

"He's gone to clean Walkers out of some of the houses we haven't gotten to yet. Carl's moving supplies, and I'm not really sure what anyone else is doing right now." Daryl said.

"Maggie and Beth are on watch. Josh and Brenda are still sleeping. I'm sure Rachel and Carol will be starting to make dinner soon. We won't be out here too much longer before its dinner time."

"How's the fence looking, Michonne?" Glenn asked.

"Looking good." Michonne said. "You've made a lot of progress."

"I figure we'll have it done by some time tomorrow." Daryl said. "It looks like it might rain, though, so that might throw a wrench into those plans."

"I could use a rain break, to tell the truth." Glenn said. "I think we could all do with a rain break. We've been busting it pretty good."

Michonne sat back and watched everyone. Hope was taking her time eating and Michonne was enjoying it. She was constantly amazed at the little day to day changes. They'd been joking that Hope was starting to develop a little bit more of a personality beyond the typical baby personality. She was fiercely motivated by food, and that was the touchiest subject for her. The rest of the time she was pretty happy and had lots of smiles for everyone. She'd also begun to respond to voices, mostly noticing Michonne, Daryl, and Carol. Judith had broken some milestones as well. She was now saying a few simple words that circled mostly around eating. She had created a title that they had figured out was what she was going to call Carol, though it sounded more like she was mimicking the sound of a crow. She had also started standing, holding onto different things, but she wasn't brave enough yet to let go of them.

When Hope finished eating Michonne got up. "Do you want me to help here?" She asked. Daryl thought for a minute.

"I tell ya what, if you're feelin' up to some Walker killin', put her back in here and you take Sasha and go clean out some more houses. It'd be good to get 'em all cleaned out soon so we can stop burnin' Walkers so often. It's makin' this place smell terrible." Daryl said.

Michonne silently helped him get Hope snuggled back into her place. She looked like she was considering a nap. Michonne kissed her little eyelids and then kissed Daryl.

"You like being a kangaroo more than you thought you would." She said.

"Yeah, it ain't so bad. I getta hang out with Hope and I can still get things done." He said, smiling.

"Come on, Sasha, let's go on Walker duty." Michonne said. Sasha took off the gloves she was wearing and followed after her.

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The alarm system of the community was complicated and imperfect to say the least. They had equipped each house with air horns and various bells that they had found so that each house could have some method of signaling distress. They'd also brought the gong in that Glenn and Maggie had found, and tested it. You could hear it in most places in the community, though not throughout, but it worked well for that street and that was all they were really worried about. They'd only used it a few times to test it since they'd been lucky and so far it appeared they were completely free from attacks.

They had also found Carol a rather loud supper bell that she used to let everyone know when it was mealtime. The downside to the supper bell was that you couldn't hear it throughout the community and if you were in a house that was farther away from it you really couldn't hear it, meaning that some of them were often late to eat.

Michonne was hungry, and she had the instinct that they were getting close to time to eat, so she kept stepping out the doors and listening for the bell. She was more than surprised, however, when it wasn't the bell she heard, but the gong. Michonne yelled for Sasha and both of them darted out the house toward Carol's place, not knowing what kind of distress they should be prepared for.

What they saw when they got there was not what they expected. Maggie was there talking to what appeared to be a middle aged couple, Beth was talking to two young guys who might have been college aged at best. Another man, somewhere between the two age groups, was standing, leaning against the fence.

Carol, who apparently had been ringing the gong came jogging up, with Carl close behind her. The others, no doubt, would be making their appearances shortly.

The "solo" man of the new group walked up to Michonne.

"Well, well, what do we have here?" He said. Michonne immediately felt the hair on her neck bristle. "Looks like they was smart and got them a couple ah jungle bunnies to work for 'em, huh?" He said. His voice made Michonne cringe even more than the insult. It was like looking at Merle reincarnated. She must have involuntarily moved a little because he smiled. "Don't worry, Midnight, I prefer my coffee with a little more cream in it." He said gesturing slightly toward Sasha. As he stepped forward he was surprised that out of nowhere there was suddenly a blade between them, right at his eye level. No one said anything. "Whoa, take it easy." He said backing up a little. Michonne glared at him.

Glenn had arrived with Tyreese and Daryl. Tyreese had a hand on Daryl's shoulder, assuring him that Michonne could handle the situation. Everyone else had kind of frozen stiffly. Glenn, himself, was a little surprised to come jogging up to find Michonne with her katana drawn, holding it in his face. Her face was completely transformed. Michonne had changed so much, letting her guard down often with them now, that _that_ Michonne still existed, but it was clear now that she was still in there.

The man backed up a little more and spit in the dirt. Michonne lowered the katana, but didn't make any move to sheathe it. "I woulda thought you'd be more the spear carryin' kind." He said. Michonne didn't say anything, she just continued to stare at him.

"What the hell y'all want here?" Daryl said, stepping beside Michonne now.

The middle aged man of the group came forward. Looking a little nervously at Michonne and a little nervously at his traveling companion.

"We have been wandering around for months." He said. "We got split up from the rest of our group when a herd attacked our camp. We were just passing through and we saw some smoke. We thought it might be our group, so we followed it. That's when we ran up on you all." He looked at Daryl for a minute, who kept glancing over at the man. "My name is Frank, and that's my wife Dora." He added. "The two boys that are travelling with us were college roommates. Their names are Jimmy and Junior. I see you've already met Earl."

Frank looked apologetic, but he didn't outright apologize for Earl's behavior. Daryl wasn't sure about this group. Everyone looked alright, except maybe Earl, and it was Earl he didn't trust. He also wasn't ready for formal introductions. He noticed that Earl kept glancing at Hope, who was awake but not fussing. Daryl also noticed that Michonne still had her katana drawn. She was as wary of Earl as he was.

"Yeah, so, we ain't your group and we ain't seen 'em." Daryl said.

"We were hoping that you might let us stay here. We're not likely to find out group and it's dangerous out there. We started out looking for them with three others, but we've lost them." Frank said, obviously realizing that Earl's introduction probably hadn't won them the best chance.

Daryl thought a moment and then turned and walked over to where Tyreese and Glenn were standing. Rick had come up close behind them.

"What do you think?" Daryl whispered. "I don't like that Earl guy."

"I think Earl's an ignorant asshole, but I don't think he's too much of a threat. If Michonne thought he was she'd have lopped his head off by now." Tyreese said.

"Yeah, my brother was one of those ignorant assholes." Daryl said.

"It is getting dark," Glenn said, "and it would be pretty bad to turn them out knowing they probably won't make it. Why don't we consider a trial? We've got more than enough extra houses, so we just give them one to see what they're like. We can all lock our doors at night, so they can't really do anything to us."

"What do you think, Tyreese? I don't want to invite no other Governor right into our space." Daryl said.

"Earl isn't Governor material. He's too stupid." Tyreese said. "I don't see how the trial could hurt. It's like Glenn said, we can lock our doors and we'd wake up if he were dumb enough to try to break one down. I say just for the night we let them stay and then we think about it in the morning."

Rick, who had been calming down a little bit since the stress of his leadership responsibilities had been lifted, nodded his head. "I'd say one night. If that goes well we can all discuss tomorrow what we want to do about them."

Daryl didn't say anything, but he nodded thoughtfully and turned back to talk to Frank.

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"Well, ain't this interestin'." Earl said as Carol handed him a plate. "I'da thought you'da had one a your blackies doin' the servin', but you must just keep them around for makin' squirrels."

"Earl," Dora ventured timidly, "we are in their home, we should be polite." She had thanked them profusely for offering them shelter for the night and a meal. The boys too had seemed grateful. It was only Earl who seemed to think that he was entitled to it.

"Yeah, so why don't you shut the fuck up?" Daryl said. He _really_ didn't like this Earl character. In fact, other than the Governor he couldn't think of anyone that he had disliked so strongly. No one else was really speaking.

"Hey, take it easy. I weren't tryin' to ruffle no feathers. I was just callin' a spade a spade." Earl said. "I'm sorry if you got all bent outta shape about it."

Luckily, after that Earl was quiet. Michonne still didn't like the looks of him, and she didn't care much for the thought of his hanging around. She had agreed with their decision to let the group stay for one night, feeling that the others, without their travel companion, might have actually been able to join them. Earl, however, was probably not going to fit in well. They'd only tolerated Merle because he was Daryl's brother.

_The world comes to an end and already we've been lucky enough to find two racist, ignorant assholes._ Michonne thought. _Don't we have all the luck?_

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"Do you really think Carol will put a spider on Maggie?" Daryl asked Michonne. She had told him the story about Maggie to lighten the mood a little, since he was worrying more than necessary. He'd checked all the doors and windows three times, but everything was still outside, indicating that the other group had probably gone to bed. She was brushing her teeth.

"I don't know. I wouldn't doubt it. You know how Carol is about being the disciplinarian." Michonne said, holding her hand under her mouth in an effort to make less of a mess with the foam.

"Why'd you go and let 'em do that anyway?" Daryl asked. "I thought you told me that if we was safe here and we was gonna stay for a long time, then we could maybe have another."

Michonne rinsed her mouth and dried it. Then she headed to the bed.

"What I told you, Daryl, is that we _maybe_ could have another _at some point._" Michonne said. "We still don't know for sure how long we're going to be here. We're still testing the water to see how safe it is."

"Yeah, but now you done gone and done that and there ain't even no chance." Daryl said.

"There's always a chance. Nothing about birth control is one hundred percent. But this stuff wears off after a while, so if, and I did say if, we decide to have another I can stop taking it. It only lasts for three months a dose." Michonne said. "Pull your lips back in, Daryl, the sky isn't falling. We were going to have to wait for a while. I'm not a gumball machine."

Daryl pulled her to him. "I didn't think you was no gumball machine, but I was kinda thinkin' we'd do it soon so Hope and her brother could be close in age."

"You do remember that I told you that you don't always get the other gender next, right Daryl?" Michonne said.

"I know, but I told you that my kids in my head always come out even. All four of 'em." Daryl said.

"Well, I'm not having four children. I've already had three and agreeing to have one more _is_ having had four. That's my limit." Michonne said. Daryl was lightening up now.

"Can't you just think about it a little 'Chonne? I mean if we was to grow food like Carol said, we could really stay here for a long time." Daryl pushed.

"OK, Daryl, I tell you what. I'll think about it as long as we don't talk about it anymore." Michonne said.

"Deal." Daryl said.

"Ever." Michonne added. Daryl laughed. He was quiet for a minute, just rubbing his hand up and down Michonne's arm.

"I didn't like that he called Hope a squirrel." Daryl said.

"He's an ignorant fuck, Daryl. Don't worry about it." Michonne said.

"Merle woulda said somethin' like that." Daryl said. He was quiet for a minute. "I mighta said somethin' like that at some point too."

Daryl looked sad again.

"Well, Daryl, we have all changed. The important thing is that you wouldn't say anything like that now and that you've learned to be truly sorry for maybe having said it in the past. You don't think like that now, and though it's sad that you once did, it's important to focus on the fact that you don't now." Michonne said.

Daryl didn't say anything. He still looked sad. Michonne kissed him and he kissed back.

"Don't worry about it anymore, Daryl, just get some sleep." She said. "Think about your four kids that I'm not going to have." Daryl smiled at her and laid his head down.


	35. Chapter 35

AN: In response to the question, no I did not intentionally make Merle and Earl's names rhyme. I honestly didn't even think about it until this morning when I was doing some planning in my head over coffee. It's kind of funny. I actually am very bad at coming up with names. Much like Daryl I could go with "Dog" as a name for a pet. That makes naming characters a very random thing in my situation. Earl is no exception.

P.S. It's my birthday! Yay!

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Maggie and Beth were finally asleep, but Glenn couldn't sleep. The pressure of one of them on one side and one of them on the other was making both of his arms go to sleep, but he didn't want to move them and risk waking them up.

No one really knew what life had become in their house. They told stories over breakfast of fun games they enjoyed, having collected as many toys as they could find in their looting of the houses. They did enjoy themselves a lot. The playing was distracting and the laughter was surely a type of medicine. Glenn was sure that he played more now than he had as a kid. That was the thing. The playing kept you busy, it kept you occupied. It made it seem like everything could be a game and everything had the potential to be funny and exciting. It kept out the reality.

It was after they played that things got bad. It was when they finally admitted that the game should be over because they needed to sleep. Then things got bad.

Sometimes it was just Maggie, and sometimes it was just Beth, but sometimes it was both of them. It was unpredictable. They would start thinking about Hershel, start missing their family, and from there it was a slippery slope to thinking about the fact that they could lose each other or that they could be killed. Glenn tried not to think about those things, even when he was comforting them, because he didn't want to not be able to help them. Sometimes it was tears, other times it was anger, but not anger at him, just anger at the world and anger at not being able to control that world.

Many nights he'd spent like this, his arms aching and going numb because he had finally gotten them both calm enough to sleep. These weren't the stories they would talk about over breakfast. He didn't want the group to get the wrong impression if they found out that Beth spent just as many nights in their bed as she spent in her own. He also knew that the group didn't need to know what was going on in his house and how much the girls were going through. It was better to tell them about nerf gun wars and lively games of Twister. Those were the good moments of life right now. Those were the moments that you shared.

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Hope woke Michonne up demanding food and demanding it urgently. Michonne got up and went to the nursery. Judith was stirring, and Hope was screaming.

"Don't be so angry about." Michonne said, picking up the baby. "Take a lesson from Judith. It's coming, just be patient."

Michonne laughed a little at Hope. She always looked furious when she was demanding food. It was like she hadn't eaten in weeks, which was clearly not the case. Michonne sat down in the rocking chair and moved Hope under nightgown. Feeling her latch, Michonne started rocking a little, watching Judith. Judith had pulled herself up and was watching Michonne over the bar of the crib.

"Ma!" Judith called. Michonne smiled at her. Judith had very rudimentary names for everyone, usually consisting of one syllable and containing only some element of their name. The names for Michonne and Maggie were pretty much the same, as were the names for Carol and Carl. A few others could only be distinguished by who she was looking at when she made them.

"Yes, it's Michonne." Michonne said, sounding her name out very slowly. "Carol will be coming soon with your breakfast, I'm sure."

Judith continued to babble loudly at her, and whatever she said must have been funny because she laughed at herself at intervals.

Carol came in and sleepily greeted Michonne. She was carrying a bottle for Judith and Judith let go of the railing, falling back on her bottom. Carol scooped her up and offered her the bottle.

"Did you sleep well?" Michonne asked Carol. Hope protested as she changed sides.

"I slept alright." Carol said. "You?"

"Can't complain." Michonne said.

"It's raining buckets out there." Carol said. "I went out earlier and put everything I could find out to catch water. I saw Josh and Brenda. They said there are a lot of Walkers outside the fences."

"Probably the rain." Michonne said.

They had started to learn more and more about the Walkers. They didn't hibernate, like Daryl had once thought, but they were more sluggish in the winter. They barely bothered with you unless you came directly into their path. The bad thing about Walkers in winter is that for some reason they seemed to form herds more often, and larger herds at that. If you encountered one alone, you really had no worries, but if you caught a herd you were probably going to get more than you bargained for.

In general Walkers were like bees. Just one wasn't much of a threat. It could be a nuisance at best. You didn't, however, want to do anything to stir up the hive because you'd be surrounded before you knew what was happening.

Rain seemed to stir them up. Whenever it rained it seemed like Walkers came out of the woodworks and they seemed particularly lively. Michonne didn't know why, but everyone agreed that rainy days were certainly not days for going on runs.

"Probably. No hot meals today, though, unless it lets up a little. There's no way to even think of starting a fire with the flood outside." Carol said.

"I haven't been out yet." Michonne said.

"The Walkers are lining up two by two." Carol said. "_That's_ how bad it is."

Michonne snickered at the thought of Walkers lining up to get on some kind of Walker arc to save themselves from the flood.

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Michonne and Carol had left Daryl with both the babies, despite the fact that he had protested, saying that he was not at all comfortable with that much responsibility. Michonne was going to help Carol get breakfast together, since it seemed like no one was up, and if they were up they weren't venturing out into the storm. By the time they go to the house they used as headquarters, both of them were drenched to the point that they might as well have been swimming.

Breakfast would be simple fare, and Carol wondered really how many people would venture out for it instead of just rely on the little bit of food that they took to their houses in their rations boxes.

"We're not going to open much up." She said to Michonne. "Just enough for us and Daryl and maybe one or two others."

"We can always make more if we need it." Michonne said, digging through boxes.

They were upstairs sorting through some of the supplies that Carol had yet to organize. Both of them heard the footsteps on the stairs, but neither of them expected it to be Earl, they had been expecting Daryl.

Michonne's hand immediately went to the handle of her katana and she didn't miss that Carol reached for the knife she wore almost all the time.

"Easy…man y'all sure are some jumpy bitches." Earl said. He was chewing on what looked like a toothpick.

_God he's filthy. _Michonne thought. She was pretty sure she had curled her lip up in disgust at him.

"We was just wonderin' if y'all had mornin' chow time around here or if y'all only eat at night." Earl said. He was staring at Michonne, and she stared back at him. She was waiting to see what her nickname for the morning would be. So far, though, Earl hadn't offered her one.

"We are making breakfast now, but if y'all would rather eat at your house, I can give you some food to take down there." Carol offered, though she didn't actually make any movement at all.

"Nah, we'll come down here." Earl said, looking back and forth between the two of them. "Wouldn't wanna miss lookin' at your happy faces over breakfast." He smiled and kissed at Michonne, who had started slowly pulling her katana out. "Calm down, darkie, I ain't no tiger." He said, turning around and leaving the room. Both of them sat frozen while they listened to him going down the stairs.

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The new group joined them for breakfast, as did Daryl, Maggie and Beth, who were going to take over watch for Josh and Brenda, and Josh and Brenda joined them, viewing the meal as their final meal before bed. Conversation had been limited at best. Daryl had uncomfortably made small talk with Frank, finding out more about the rest of the group that they had been separated from and also about a few other groups that they had encountered. They were definitely not alone out here, but Daryl hoped the other groups wouldn't include such a rare gem as Earl among them if they came calling at the gates.

After breakfast, Daryl had decided it was time for a meeting. They had to figure out what they were going to do about the new group. He walked, in the rain, from door to door, knocking and telling everyone he was calling a meeting immediately in their meeting room.

They had established their own kind of government now that functioned very differently than it had under Rick. Daryl was their "leader" in that he was the one that ultimately made decisions, and he was the one that called meetings when something needed to be discussed, but he by no means made those decisions alone. When he called a meeting it was a rule that at least one person from each household had to be there, with the exception of Josh and Brenda who were the resident night owls of the group and therefore slept through the day having declared that they both trusted whatever judgment the group arrived at on any particular problem and would be filled in at breakfast or dinner.

In the meetings whoever wanted to attend could, but they didn't have to as long as someone was there to represent their household. The problem to be discussed was always thrown out by Daryl once they were all comfortable and anyone who had anything to say could throw their two cents worth in. Then, Daryl would consider all things said and go from there with making a decision. At any point someone could raise an issue with Daryl they thought needed to be considered, and he would make sure that, as a group, they took care of it. Everyone had become quite comfortable with the way everything worked. No one felt like they were being ignored.

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"I don't like him." Michonne said. "He needs to go."

"I agree." Carol said. "He makes me uncomfortable."

"What about the rest of his group?" Tyreese asked. "They really don't seem that bad."

"Well then how did they end up traveling with Earl?" Rick asked, though it sounded more like a statement than a question.

"Well we all ended up travelling with a lot of different kinds of people." Daryl said. "Maybe they just

"That's true, but don't you think you'd try to shake a guy like Earl? I mean you wouldn't really want to keep traveling with him." Rick said.

"Well, there's strength in numbers." Glenn said. "Maybe he's a really good Walker killer."

"Personally, I think I'd trip him if we were fighting Walkers together." Maggie said. "He's just gross and I don't like him. He licked his lips at me over breakfast." She visibly shuddered.

"Ok, so we know that Earl's gotta go." Daryl said. "Do we give any of the rest of them the option to stay?"

"I'm all for letting everyone else stay if they want to." Tyreese said.

"Do you really think his whole group would abandon him?" Beth asked. "I mean if it were us, could we just push someone out the door _alone?_"

"If it were one of us, no, we couldn't just send them out there alone, but none of us are like Earl. Earl was the kind of man that you didn't want to be around before everyone went crazy, now you certainly don't want him around. For the most part we're all relatively harmless." Carol said.

"Not to Walkers." Glenn said with a snort.

"Or to Governors." Maggie added, snickering.

"I'd say give them the option." Rick said. "If they want to abandon Earl and stay, we'll see how it goes. If they feel some kind of dedication and responsibility for Earl, then we let them go with him. Either way, they decide their own fate."

"I think you're right." Daryl said.

"What if he refuses to go?" Beth asked.

Everyone was quiet for a minute. He may put up a fight, not wanting to go back out there, but one way or another they would get him outside of the gates.

"Then we'll handle it." Daryl said. "I'll tell them at dinner that they're leavin' after breakfast if they choose to go with Earl. I won't send them out today because the fences are swarming with Walkers and that would be sending them out into pretty certain death. Hopefully the rain lets up tonight. Everyone just make sure you keep your doors locked tonight in case Earl gets in a little bit of a grumpy mood after he hears we're evictin' him."

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Michonne was only barely woken by the tapping on the door. She mumbled what she had meant to be "Come in," but what had really come out as something completely intelligible.

"Judith is in her crib. I'm leaving her with you." Carol said. Michonne mumbled in response and drifted back off to sleep a little.

She snapped to a minute later. Carol was leaving Judith with her, like she did most mornings when she went to start breakfast. Michonne thought for a minute and then jumped up, fumbling around getting dressed. She snatched her katana from the corner and slung it on as she started down the stairs.

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Carol had been walking through the yard of the main house and had not expected at all to be slammed to the ground with an arm going around her neck and choking off her air supply. She immediately tried to get to her knife, but he'd anticipated that already and threw it somewhere. She struggled against him and tried to scream now that he'd taken his arm from around her neck. He had pinned her with his weight and with one arm he was holding her arms behind her back at a funny angle. With the other he was trying to pull her pants down, clawing at her.

"You'll like this a lot more if you quit fightin'." He said. "Ain't nobody up yet but us. I been waitin' for ya."

He forced himself into her and Carol half screamed again, crying and trying to get her arms loose.

_This isn't happening. It couldn't be happening._

Suddenly Earl stopped moving, but he didn't let go of Carol's arms yet.

Michonne had dug the blade just deep enough into his back where it wouldn't do any major damage, but it certainly would take away any interest he had in his current activity.

"Here's what's going to happen." Michonne said calmly. "I'm going to back up just a bit, and you're going to get off of her. Don't think of making any sudden moves, because I swear to you that I will fucking skewer you."

She backed up a little. Earl hadn't said anything either, but he responded by getting off of Carol and fastening his pants. Michonne looked at him for minute, thinking how satisfied she'd feel if she cut off his dick right now.

Carol fastened her pants, but she felt so shaky that she handn't gotten to her feet yet.

"Carol. Can you get up?" Michonne asked. She didn't take her eyes off of Earl.

"Yeah." Carol stammered, getting to her feet.

"I need you to go get Daryl, and tell him to bring some rope." Michonne said.

"What the hell do you need rope for?" Earl asked as Carol started walking away.

"You seem like a good ole boy, I'd imagine you could come up with a lot of creative things to do with rope." Michonne said.

Daryl didn't know what had happened. Carol was crying when she got there and woke him. She told him to bring rope. Michonne was missing. Carol didn't tell him what happened, she just told him to go to headquarters and she went into her room.

Daryl didn't have roped, but they did have some old sheets that he was ripping into lengths and as he walked. When he got to where Michonne was standing, her katana pointed at Earl's chest, she told him to tie Earl's hands behind his back. Daryl did.

"Take it easy, man, she done sliced up my back." Earl said.

"You're lucky she didn't slice off your head." Daryl said. He could feel himself growing very angry right now. He had figured out what had happened and the more he thought about it, the angrier he got. They had given this man food, they'd given him shelter, and they'd even been nice enough to let him stay an extra night to give him better odds of making it out there and he'd repaid them by being a total dick and by taking advantage of Carol. "I'd love to put an arrow through your damn head right now, so I'd advise you to just keep your fuckin' mouth shut." Daryl said.

Michonne had been watching Daryl grow angrier and angrier as he thought about it. She was furious and had used all of her willpower not to kill Earl, not wanting to be his sole judge and jury. She would gladly be the executioner if they decided to sentence him to death, which was what she was going to recommend.

"Man what you gettin' all worked up for? You been greedy keepin' two of 'em to yourself. It didn't feel like you been takin' care of her no way." Earl said.

"I mean it, shut the fuck up!" Daryl yell. He needed to go get the others, but looking up he could see that Maggie and Glenn were walking toward him, as were Josh and Brenda from another direction.

"What's going on?" Josh called. They'd been on watch on the other side of the community, and had only recently started in the direction of the headquarters to see if breakfast would be ready soon, so they hadn't heard a thing until they heard Daryl yell.

"Calm down, I wasn't gonna touch your nigger." Earl said.

That was the last thing Earl ever said. It was the last thing Earl thought. Without any hesitation Daryl had raised his crossbow and shot him in the face. What had been Earl crumpled to the ground and Daryl stood there, still holding his crossbow.

Everyone had frozen. Michonne wasn't sorry. She could see, however, from the look on Daryl's face that he hadn't meant to do it. It had been an involuntary action. She sheathed her katana and walked over, putting her hand on Daryl's shoulder. He was looking down at Earl.

"The world's a better place without him in it." Michonne said. Daryl didn't respond. "He deserved what he got, Daryl, if it hadn't been you I would have done it."

The other four people that witnessed Earl's execution approached. Maggie had no idea what had happened, but she knew it wasn't good. She hadn't heard much of the conversation. All she had gotten was something about touching Michonne.

"Are you OK?" Maggie asked, walking up and gingerly putting a hand on Michonne's shoulder.

"Carol." Michonne said. It was enough for Maggie to understand. She looked at Glenn, uncomfortably. Glenn was in shock still.

They all just stood there quietly for a moment. Finally, Daryl turned around to face Michonne.

"Well, I reckon' I better go tell that group that they're down one." Daryl said. "We're gonna have to have a long talk with 'em to decide if any of 'em are gonna stay now."

Daryl started off toward the house the new group was staying in and Michonne went back to their house to check on Carol.

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"Carol?" Michonne called, knocking on Carol's door. There was no response. She opened it, a little. "Carol, it's Michonne. I'm coming in." Michonne could hear Carol crying. As she opened the door she noticed Carol's clothes discarded on the floor. Carol was standing by her dresser, completely naked, scrubbing herself with a washcloth and crying.

Michonne unashamedly walked over to her. "Carol, I think you're as clean as you're gonna be." She said softly. Carol just shook her head and kept crying. Michonne took her hand and gently took the washcloth, laying it on the dresser. She hugged Carol and held her to her, letting her cry for a few minutes and wishing she had gotten out there sooner. After Carol had cried for a few minutes, she finally seemed cried out, at least for now. Michonne looked around and found a handkerchief, wiping Carol's face and holding it for her to blow her nose like she used to do when her girls were sick.

"Can we get you dressed?" Michonne asked softly. "We need to go over to headquarters and get some bandages. You're pretty scratched up. And Daryl's going to want to have a conversation with everyone about whether or not any of the others stay." Michonne had started making moves to get Carol dressed, and Carol was silently cooperating.

"I don't want to see…I can't see him." Carol said.

"He's dead." Michonne said.

"What?" Carol asked.

"He is no longer with us. Daryl shot him, point blank, in the face with an arrow." Michonne said. Somehow it felt satisfying to say that. "I think he's going to consider letting the other people stay, or he might not. If you don't want anyone to stay, then they won't. We hesitated too long with Earl and we're not hesitating with anyone else if instinct tells us not to."

Her

Carol didn't respond, but she did help Michonne finish dressing her. When she was dressed, Michonne brought her another washcloth to wash her face with.

"Ready?" Michonne asked. Carol nodded and they went to get the babies to go to headquarters.

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"Earl really wasn't our type of person." Dora said. "In fact, no one really liked him. It just so happened that he got separated with us when the herd came through."

"He was a pretty good shot, so we let him follow us around to help out with killing the…what do y'all call them? Walkers? Anyway, we certainly didn't keep Earl around because he had a stellar personality." Frank said.

"I was always scared of him." Jimmy admitted. Junior nodded in agreement.

None of the group had responded negatively over the news of Earl's death. In fact, they'd almost seemed _happy_ about it and had apologized profusely for his actions. Now they were begging to stay, trying to convince Daryl that none of them were like Earl and none of them had any intention of bringing any harm to his _family_.

"OK, listen." Daryl said. "Y'all gotta go outside for a little while. Take a walk. We gotta talk." Daryl said. The four of them got up, quickly.

"Y'all have a real nice place here." Dora said before she left the room. "I hope you can find it in your hearts to forgive us for having brought Earl here, and to consider letting us earn back your trust." She followed behind her husband.

When they were gone, Daryl looked around at the group. Carol was holding Judith and so hugged up on Michonne that she was practically sitting in her lap. Everyone else looked sad, Daryl knew they all felt as bad for Carol as he did.

"What are we gonna do?" He asked. "I don't wanna take no chances."

"I think they're good people." Maggie said finally. No one else wanted to speak. "I haven't gotten any bad vibes from them, like I did from Earl."

"I agree." Carol said. It was the first thing that she had said since she got there, so everyone looked at her. "I don't think they're bad people. I think bad people just happened to them. Daryl saved them from…Daryl saved them."

Daryl hung his head a minute, thinking. "Fine, if no one is opposed to it, then we let them stay. From now on, though, there's a new law. There's no tellin' who we're gonna meet up with in the future. If anyone gets any of the same feelin's 'bout someone else we meet like they got about Earl, we deal with it right then and there. They can either get the hell away from us or we kill 'em if we fuckin' have to, but we don't sit 'round on it waitin' to see if our instincts were right."

Everyone nodded. Glenn kept looking at Carol. It was hard to think that the world had come to that. They could be meeting people that they had to kill just to get them before they got to anyone in the group. That saddened Glenn a lot, but he didn't blame Daryl at all. He thought he might have done the same thing in Daryl's position. Actually, he wished that he could go back to the first night they'd arrived, when Michonne had her katana near Earl's head, and tell her to do it then, but they couldn't turn back time, they could only learn from their mistakes and realize that this was a world where action had to be taken and it had to be taken quickly.


	36. Chapter 36

AN: Shorter chapter, I know, but today has been pretty busy and pretty draining. So I've had less energy and less time to write. Still, I figured giving those of you who read regularly a little something was better than giving you nothing at all. If I get a chapter in tomorrow it'll probably be short too, but I'll see if I can't scrape up a little extra time. For everyone still reading, I hope you enjoy.

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"I think you drew blood." Daryl said, still trying to catch his breath.

"I think you gave it as good as you got it." Michonne said.

"I didn't hear you complainin'." Daryl said.

"I wasn't complaining, and I'm not complaining now." She responded. "So do you want to talk about it now?"

It was more than obvious that Daryl had a lot of things on his mind. Daryl was usually very gentle in bed, even more so than Michonne would have preferred at times, but that had not been the case at all tonight.

"Do you think I'm crazy, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked.

"No, Daryl, I don't think you're crazy. Crazy people rarely ask if someone thinks they're crazy." Michonne said.

"I kinda felt crazy when I killed that man today." Daryl said.

"Well, maybe you had a crazy moment. We all have those, but you did what needed to be done. This world's bad enough without people like Earl walking around in it. Because of him it's going to take Carol a while to get over this."

"But she'll be alright?" Daryl asked. He'd been concerned about her. She didn't eat dinner with everyone else. Instead Maggie and Beth had made dinner and Michonne had brought her some back to her room. She didn't come out of her room at all, actually. He had been the one to put Lil' Asskicker down for bed.

"She'll be alright eventually, Daryl. A woman goes through a lot when someone does that to her, and I think Carol's been through a lot more than she lets on sometimes." Michonne said. She had gone in Carol's room and sat with her while she ate. Carol hadn't really wanted conversation, and Michonne had understood. Carol had asked her to stay with her while she fell asleep, and Michonne had tried to be as comforting as she could, silently rubbing her back while she drifted off.

"She had a husband that used to hit on her." Daryl said. "He got killed in an attack on our camp." Daryl was silent for a few minutes, obviously still thinking because he was kind of nervously playing with Michonne's fingers. "I don't understand it, 'Chonne." He said after a minute.

"Understand what?" Michonne asked.

"I mean I ain't never been so horny that I would do that to no one. If I want to have sex with you and you don't want to have sex with me I get a little bummed out, but I figure that you'll wanna do it later, so I just wait." Daryl said. "I don't think I'd like it very much if you wasn't wantin' to be part of it."

"Rape isn't about sex, Daryl." Michonne said. "That's what really makes men like Earl so disgusting. It's about power over someone and about wanting to humiliate them. He wasn't horny, he just wanted to hurt Carol, and it didn't even have to be Carol, I'm guessing. It just so happens that she is the only one of us that very often is alone."

"I hate that we let him stay here. I felt like I shoulda thrown him out the first night, but I didn't. I let Carol down." Daryl said.

"You didn't let Carol down, Daryl. Actually I think you elevated yourself a little more in her eyes as a hero because you killed Earl. Right now I think Carol is really blaming herself more than she's blaming anybody else." Michonne said.

"That don't make sense. It weren't her fault." Daryl said.

"Doesn't have to make sense, Daryl. We all think a lot of things that don't make any sense." Michonne said.

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The next morning Michonne fed Hope and watched Judith, who was sucking on a bottle and toddling around the nursery. She hadn't mastered walking yet, but she was falling less and less. Once she'd gotten the guts to let go of the coffee table downstairs, after circling it about four times holding on, she'd happily discovered that she now had the freedom to follow anyone in the house, unless they shut a door, closed the baby gate, or put her in her crib.

Michonne could tell that Judith was missing Carol. Mostly because she kept cawing at her, which was the sound she always made to call Carol. Carol hadn't been out of her room yet, and Michonne was starting to get concerned.

She got up with Hope and walked to Carol's bedroom door, Judith following behind her. She knocked.

"Carol are you up yet?" She asked. She may not be. Daryl was still snoring in the other room.

"Come in." Carol said. Michonne came in. Carol was dressed and sitting on her bed. Judith came in behind Michonne, and seeing Carol she smiled and called to her, walking over. Michonne sat on the bed and Carol picked Judith up.

"I didn't know if you were awake yet." Michonne said.

"I heard Hope wake up." Carol said.

"Do you want to go get some breakfast?" Michonne nudged.

"Not really." Carol said.

"You need to eat." Michonne said. "If it were me, you wouldn't let me just not eat."

"It wouldn't have been you, Michonne." Carol said. "Something like this wouldn't happen to you. Something like this would happen to me because I wasn't strong enough to fight him. I wasn't even fast enough to get to my knife." She was choking up again and Michonne reached over and rubbed her back a minute.

"Carol, what if I told you that it _has_ happened to me." Michonne ventured.

Carol looked at her, but she didn't say anything.

"It happened to me in college." Michonne said. "I remember it very clearly. I'd been at a party and I'd had a little too much to drink and there was this guy at the party that was paying attention to me all night, and I was flirting with him, but not much. I had told my friend that was with me not to let me do anything stupid, but I guess she wasn't paying me too much attention because she let me leave with him. He was going to take me back to my dorm. I guess he thought that meant that he deserved some form of payment for it, whether or not I wanted to give him anything." Michonne remembered fighting him, but he'd ultimately won the fight. She remembered afterwards, feeling so ashamed and so dirty. She could relate to Carol who had been scrubbing herself vigorously with the washcloth. Michonne hadn't told anyone because she'd felt so ashamed and so _guilty_. Unfortunately for Carol, she couldn't hide from hers.

"I'm sorry." Carol said.

"I guess I am just trying to say that it can happen to anyone, and you will overcome it." Michonne said.

"You would have never thought that after all this time, that would be something that would happen to you. I've thought about being killed by Walkers, and I have thought about being killed by the Governor, but I never thought about the fact that _this_ would have happened." Carol said.

"We got a little too comfortable because we haven't encountered a lot of people." Michonne said. "No one in our group would do anything like that, and we've forgotten that the Governor probably wasn't the only bad person to make it this long. We forgot that there are more threats out there than just Walkers or starvation."

Carol just nodded her head.

Michonne got up. "Come on, let's go get breakfast." She said. Carol got up and followed her. Daryl, still looking very sleepy, was coming out of their bedroom. He smiled at Carol.

"Good mornin'. Feelin' better?" He asked. Carol's face made it clear that she obviously wasn't feeling any better, but Daryl didn't really know just what to say. She half nodded, and he followed her and Michonne down the stairs.

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Dora wondered if everyone in this group was always this quiet or if they were quiet because they were there. Hardly anyone spoke when they were around. She knew it was probably a cloud hanging around because of Earl. She had spoken to Maggie when they'd first entered the gates, and Maggie had seemed like a cheerful girl, though their friendliness hadn't lasted long because Earl had started with the black woman with the sword.

They still hadn't had formal introductions. She'd been introduced to Maggie and Beth when they first entered and learned that they were sisters. Maggie was married to the Asian boy, but Dora didn't know his name. She could tell from the way that they acted and the fact that Maggie wore a ring that they were married. She also knew that they lived in a house with Beth.

Dora had also learned Daryl's name and Carol's name. Carol's name she knew because of the incident, and Daryl was the one that had done most of the talking around them. He was the one that asked most of the questions and gave the decree that, at first, they would have to leave, and then that they would be allowed to stay, but they were on trial to make sure that they all behaved the way they should. Dora was sure they wouldn't disappoint. She and Frank were just retirees that had been on vacation. The two boys, Jimmy and Junior, were good boys.

Dora was trying to figure the rest of the group out. Daryl was apparently the leader of the group, which she had heard him refer to as his family, though she doubted they'd begun this as a family. If it was a family, however, he was the patriarch of it, despite the presence of other men. Carol had seemed like the matriarch figure of the family, perhaps. She apparently did the cooking, and Dora was unsure of her other roles.

What Dora couldn't figure out was their arrangement. Carol had a baby. The black woman with a sword had a baby. She had gathered that her child was clearly his child, because he doted on it, and she hadn't known too many men that would wear their children around like he had been doing the first night they arrived. His affections for the black woman were fairly obvious as well, but she couldn't figure out about Carol. She'd decided that either Carol's husband had unfortunately died before the baby was born, or maybe they lived in some kind of polygamous relationship and he just favored the black woman. One day Dora hoped to be able to figure it out.

As far as the other households, she knew that there was one couple that had a teenage son. There was another black couple, with a man that was obviously a type of consultant to Daryl because Daryl was always talking to him about them. There was also another young couple that she only saw at meal times.

She didn't know any of their names and she didn't really know if she should ask them anything. Daryl had said they agreed that they could stay, but no one seemed really interested in getting to know them. She decided she'd stay quiet for a while, waiting for everyone to cool down about Earl.

_I wish I had never seen Earl. I wish he wouldn't have gotten split up with us. I wish he'd died in the attack._

They had been with three other college kids. Two other boys and one girl. They were all good kids. They were all scared and had been part of Jimmy and Junior's original group. She'd hated seeing all of them get torn apart. They were just kids. Seeing them get torn apart made her lose a little bit of hope of finding her own kids and her grandson. Her grandson had been about the size of Carol's daughter. She wondered what he looked like now, not allowing herself to think that it was possible that something had happened to him.

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"Daryl, I think you did the right thing." Tyreese said. They were finishing up the fence, but it was obvious that Daryl was distracted because he wasn't talking, and Tyreese had grown fond of the chats he had with Daryl while working. He liked talking to him. Daryl was easy to talk to. Tyreese was certain his silence came from thinking about killing Earl. "Hell man, I thought about doing it. I didn't like the way he looked at Tasha, and if I'd been in your shoes and he'd put his filthy hands on my baby sister, I'd have fucking killed him too."

"I feel like I did the right thing." Daryl said. "I just don't like the thought of it, you know? I mean killin' Walkers is one thing, but I ain't killed a lot of living people. You know I killed people during that whole mess with the Governor, but that was different. That was war, you know what I'm sayin'? Now we just gotta go 'round bein' ready to kill anyone we meet 'cause they might turn out to be assholes?"

"There isn't any police or anything anymore to find out if they're bad or not, so yeah we have to look out for them now." Tyreese said.

"You think we're gonna run up with a lot more people?" Daryl asked.

"I don't know but just from what Frank said about how many groups they've met wandering, I suppose we will. It seems like there are quite a few more in the area. You know that's how the Governor built Woodbury, collecting a bunch of small groups into a town." Tyreese said.

"Well, if we gon build us a town like that, we're not gonna have any Earls in it." Daryl said definitively. "I ain't havin' people wonderin' if they gon get hurt goin' to eat breakfast."

"Well, I'm behind you on that. We have to go back to the old West laws of policing, I guess. You commit the crime, we shoot you." Tyreese said.

"Yeah 'cept now it's you look like you might commit the crime and you can either leave or we shoot you." Daryl said.

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"What are you doing?" Michonne walked up to Daryl who was in the yard outside headquarters jabbing wire down into the dirt.

"Buildin' a pen for Lil' Asskicker." Daryl said. "Carol said she needed somewhere safe to put her while she was doin' stuff 'cause the kid wanders around. You think this is gon be big enough?"

The "pen" that Daryl was building was almost the size of the entire yard.

"It's definitely a vast improvement on size from the playpens we used to have." Michonne said.

"Here." Daryl said, stopping what he was doing and reaching in his boot. He produced Carol's knife and handed it to Michonne. "I found this in the grass. Figured she might want it back."

"She might, but she probably won't right now." Michonne said. She decided she'd keep it for a little while and give it back to Carol later, when the storm of emotions had passed. These days your weapon was your friend, an extension of you. It offered you protection. Having it made you feel safe, and she was sure that right now Carol would feel that her knife, thought it had saved her in quite a few Walker battles, had let her down. She needed a little time before she was ready to face it again. For now she was unarmed, but she made sure that she was never alone, staying always in the company of someone from their group, and almost avoiding the other group entirely.


	37. Chapter 37

Dora was feeling pretty much useless at this point. Everybody seemed to have jobs. They seemed to know what they were doing, but she didn't know what she was supposed to be doing and neither did Frank, Jimmy, or Junior. When they were alone in their house at night, having chosen to stay together, they talked about the other group. How could they break the ice? How could they get involved?

This morning they were finishing up breakfast, in what had become the most uncomfortable silence ever. Dora was considering approaching Carol after breakfast and asking if she could help with something, _anything_.

"Someone's going to have to make a run for water." Carol said, coming into the dining room. "We need to wash clothes and I don't have enough water for that."

"I'll go." Dora said immediately.

"I'll cover her." Sasha said. Michonne, without saying anything, got up and handed Hope over to Daryl.

It was settled, Dora thought. She'd go get water with two of the people who she didn't even know the names of. She wasn't sure where they were going or exactly how this worked, but she was going to get water. She was also hopeful that she'd find out what they were named at least. She'd like to feel like she knew them at least well enough to think of them by their names and not their characteristics.

Outside, the woman with the sword had silently given Dora two buckets. Each of them had taken one. Maggie and her husband opened the gate for them and they passed through, the two women accompanying Dora immediately killed off a few Walkers lumbering around outside.

"It's getting cold." Dora said. She shivered, wishing she'd worn more clothes. When she got no response from her travel companions, she decided to try again. "I'm Dora." She prompted. There wasn't any real response. This wasn't going to work out the way that she had seen it going in her head.

Sasha could tell the woman was uncomfortable and she felt sorry for her. For a minute she could remember what it had been like when she'd first joined this group, wondering if all of these new and strange people would ever speak to her or accept her. She didn't know which would have been worse, coming here and having Earl hanging over your head like a crowd, or coming here and trying to find your place under Rick, who had been more than a little unpredictable.

"I'm Sasha." She said, finally. The woman smiled and looked a little relieved. "That's Michonne." She offered, just in case Michonne wasn't in the mood to talk to Dora. "She doesn't talk too much." Sasha said. When she first had arrived, she'd been terrified of Michonne. Now she'd come to realize that Michonne just had a way of walling herself in. Some days she was open and would talk to you, but anytime anything happened she distanced herself and seemed to live mostly in silence. Michonne hadn't really addressed many of them the past few days.

Dora felt relieved to know that Sasha was willing to talk to her. It also made her feel a little better to know that Michonne didn't talk much. Maybe it wasn't something against her, maybe Michonne just wasn't a chatty person. Dora _was_ a chatty person. She loved to talk and she loved people. She was very social when they lived in Florida. They'd lived in a retirement village, not because they needed any kind of assistance or thought they would need it any time soon, but because it put them in close vicinity with a lot of people with similar interests, and since their children had grown up and moved away, they enjoyed the feeling of community. Dora had been quite popular there and loved entertaining all her friends.

"Frank and I were on vacation when all this started." Dora said. "This part wasn't in the brochure."

Sasha, walked away for a minute, killing a Walker that was a few feet away. Though it hadn't really shown much interest in them, she wanted to go ahead and get it out of the way. One Walker down was one less to worry about if they were herding.

"When it really got bad I was at home from college for the weekend." Sasha said. "I hadn't really included all of this in my weekend plans either."

"Was the guy your boyfriend before all of this?" Dora asked. Sasha looked at her in a confused manner. "The man you live with…he's not your boyfriend?"

Sasha laughed. "Oh Lord, no! Tyreese is my big brother." Sasha said. Dora heard Michonne snicker.

"Sorry, I just thought he was your boyfriend. I'm still trying to figure everything out." Dora said.

"No big deal." Sasha said. They finally reached the creek and Dora followed suit and filled her buckets. They were heavy, and it was a longer walk than she had anticipated, but she wasn't going to complain. She'd finally gotten Sasha to talk to her, and though Michonne wasn't saying anything, her face looked significantly more relaxed than it had over breakfast.

"What year were you in college?" Dora asked on the way back.

"Senior." Sasha said. "I was looking forward to graduating, but now I guess that doesn't matter."

"Jimmy was a senior in college, too." Dora said. "I guess y'all are about the same age. I think Junior was a sophomore."

Sasha didn't say anything. Dora felt a little awkward. She was just carrying water, but Michonne and Sasha were carrying water and handling any of the dead ones that came near. They called them Walkers. The group that she'd been with before had just called them the Dead. There had always been stories, always been jokes about the zombie apocalypse. Dora had always laughed at them, never imagining what it would be like to be in the middle of it, and here she was. She was in the middle of it and right now was trying to figure out how to become an accepted member of this group. That was an obstacle she hadn't seen coming.

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Beth was inside passing out supplies into boxes. Carol kept coming in and out of the house doing various activities, trying to keep her mind busy. She was also washing clothes and hanging them to dry on some of the lines that Daryl had hung for her in the yard. She stopped every now and again because it was getting cold and that meant the water was cold. It made her hands stiff if she didn't take breaks to supervise Beth. She had put Judith in her little yard with some toys that Maggie and Glenn had found for her and Judith was more than happy to sit and play with them or to toddle around yelling at anyone who she could see.

"Did you bring your clothes down here?" Carol asked, walking in the room where Beth was trying not to lose her concentration.

"Yeah, I did." Beth said. "I brought them yesterday."

"It doesn't look like the pile is the same size as it normally is. Somebody didn't bring theirs." Carol said. She had brought the clothes from their house, but it annoyed her when others didn't bring theirs.

"Probably Josh and Brenda." Beth said. "They always forget. I can go get them if you want."

"No, I'll go." Carol said. She could forgive them. They had very odd schedules and she imagined it could be difficult to remember everything, like laundry, and still work the night watch every night. "Keep an ear out for Judith."

Carol walked out of the house. She waved at Judith who was watching her and started down the street to Josh and Brenda's house, hoping they'd at least been tidy enough to keep their laundry in the basket she'd given them. She didn't want to go plundering around looking for dirty underwear while they slept. On the way down she passed Michonne on the sidewalk.

"Carol, can you help me a minute?" Michonne asked. She was carrying Hope in one arm and the wrap in the other.

"Sure." Carol said. She stopped and helped Michonne get Hope situated. Hope yawned a few times. "You probably could have put her down for a while. It looks like she'll be going to sleep soon."

"It's OK, she can nap with me. I'm just going to salvage a couple of houses so it doesn't matter if she's with me." Michonne said.

"There are plenty of empty boxes at headquarters." Carol said. "Yesterday Maggie made a big score in one of the houses. Apparently they were going to move because she said most of the work had been done for her and everything was in boxes. Now she's just got to finish going through them to see what we might actually want."

"Well, I hope that someone finds more baby clothes. Judith and Hope are both growing like weeds." Michonne said.

"All set." Carol said, adjust the wrap for the final time. "Comfortable?"

"Feels fine." Michonne said. She paused while Carol kissed Hope. Michonne started off in the direction of headquarters and Carol finished making her way to Josh and Brenda's house.

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They had not been as tidy as Carol had hoped. She'd collected most of what she could find, not really knowing if the clothes scattered throughout the house were clean or dirty. They were not very good housekeepers. She carried the basket back to headquarters. Coming in sight of the yard she scanned Judith's pen. She stopped. Judith wasn't there. Carol jogged over, put down the basket and ran inside. Michonne and Beth were both upstairs, but Judith wasn't with them.

"Where's Judith?" Carol asked, trying not to panic.

"She was outside in her pen." Michonne said.

"Well she's not there." Carol said.

Michonne could see that Carol was headed for a total meltdown.

"Calm down," Michonne said, starting down the stairs. "We'll find her." By the time they got to the yard Carol had started to become unraveled. "Carol, calm down." Michonne said, surveying the yard. "There are no Walkers and no blood, so she didn't get taken by a Walker. Daryl built this thing stronger than Fort Benning, so that means that someone has her. We've just got to find them and you'll see that Judith is fine."

They started down the street and coming toward them was Dora, carrying Judith who was hugging a stuffed duck that was almost as big as she was.

"Oh God!" Carol said, running toward her and taking Judith out of her arms, hugging her. Carol was crying, so Judith responded by doing the same.

Dora looked shocked. Michonne walked over to them.

"See, no reason to panic, Carol. She's fine." Michonne said.

"I'm sorry." Dora stammered. "I was going to ask if Carol wanted help with the laundry. The baby was alone, and we have a bunch of stuffed animals and dolls in one of the rooms in our house. I just thought she might want to pick out a friend. I didn't mean to upset anyone."

Carol was calming down now, as was Judith.

"It's fine." Michonne said. "Just next time let someone know if you're taking her somewhere. It's a shock to think she's going to be somewhere and then she's not."

Michonne didn't think that Dora was a threat. She seemed like a nice older woman. Maybe she'd even had grandchildren. Judith didn't seemed threatened by her either. In fact, Michonne was certain that the only reason Judith was crying a little now was because she didn't know what was upsetting Carol. Even Hope was squirming uncomfortably against her, probably responding to her tensing up.

"I'm sorry." Dora said again.

"It's OK." Carol said finally.

"Do you need some help with the laundry? I know there's a lot of it for one person to do by hand." Dora offered.

Carol paused a minute and nodded. They headed back to the headquarters.

When they got there, Michonne went back inside to gather up the boxes that she had been emptying when Carol came in. Carol kissed the top of Judith's head and put her back in the pen. Judith protested at first, but then gave up.

Dora sat with Carol and started washing clothes.

"I didn't mean to upset you." Dora said. "I guess I should have thought about telling someone that I was taking her. What's her name again?"

"Judith." Carol said.

"She's really sweet. So calm." Dora said.

"She has to be these days." Carol said. It was true that Judith was a lot different than she remembered Sophia being. It was like she had an understanding of the madness around her. Like she had instinctually learned that her life was going to be one in which there was no need to fuss about things because it really wasn't going to change your situation.

Dora decided that if she was going to get Carol to talk to her, now was as good a time as ever since she had her as a more or less captive audience.

"Did your husband die?" She ventured. Carol stopped washing the clothes for a minute. The she started again.

"Yeah. He died in a Walker attack." She said.

"I'm sorry. Was it here?" Dora asked. She couldn't imagine Walkers getting in here, but it could be possible.

"No." Carol said. "An attack on a camp we were at, back when everything was first happening."

It was possible then that Judith was a little older than she thought she was, or it was possible that the baby had not been Carol's husband's child. Maybe she had been right about the whole polygamous relationship. Dora didn't know how to proceed any further delicately. She sighed.

"I don't know how to ask this, so I'm just going to ask it." She started. "Was he the father?"

"What?" Carol asked.

"Was your husband Judith's father?" Dora asked.

Carol realized now that Dora was confused. She laughed a little. Maybe to a stranger's eyes there was a lot to be confused about in this bunch.

"Judith isn't my child." Carol said. She laughed again, but this time it was at Dora's face.

"Did you find her?" Dora asked.

"Not really. Her mother used to be in our group. She was married to Rick. I guess that Judith is Rick's child, but I don't think she knows she is. She's more likely to think Daryl is her father." Carol clarified for her.

Dora assumed by now that Rick was the other man in the group that hadn't been identified for her. The one that had the teenage son. She couldn't figure out why he and the woman that apparently wasn't his wife but was living as his wife didn't have the baby. Why had they given it to Carol? She would have never guessed that Carol wasn't the mother of the child from the way she treated it. Dora decided not to pry into that right now. She'd maybe find out later.

"Is there anyone else that you don't know yet?" Carol asked.

"Who is Rick's…girlfriend or whatever."

"Rachel." Carol said.

"And Maggie's husband?" Dora asked.

"Glenn." Carol responded.

"What about that other couple, the ones that only eat breakfast and dinner with us because they do watches at night?"

"Josh and Brenda." Carol said.

"Is the baby Michonne takes care of hers?" Dora asked. She'd decided it was better not to assume things about this group. They were unpredictable.

"Yes, that's her baby. That's Hope. I guess Hope is maybe four months old." Carol said. She'd lost track of time.

"So Daryl and Michonne are together." Dora said.

"Yeah, they actually got married when Glenn and Maggie got married. We were already waiting for Hope then." Carol said.

"And you live with them?"

Dora's statement had been half a statement and half a question. Carol smiled at her.

"Yeah, we all live together. They took me in." Carol said. She got up, picking up some of the clothes to go and hang them. "Don't get any ideas, though, it's nothing like that." She added.


	38. Chapter 38

AN: LMBO at Dora the Explorer. I thought of that too when I was writing the last chapter. I had to sing the theme song in my head before I could continue writing. As with all names, I just yanked it out of the air and later I was like "Why did you do that to yourself?"

Also, I've finally dealt with my problem with Carl. The problem with Carl for me is that they've introduced a new possibly crazy Carl to the show, but it's not one that I feel like I can write because I don't have a feel for that Carl. That means that I'm solving the problem by making Carl kind of OC, I guess. I'm just going to build my own Carl.

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It was a quiet day in the neighborhood. Most everyone was inside. Dora and Frank were sitting on the porch in some rocking chairs that Dora had found at another house, just listening to the rain. Dora had thought she might never get to do that again, but here she was, just rocking and listening to the rain. Their house was across the street from the house that Maggie, Glenn, and Beth had chosen. She felt like a nosy neighbor because…well frankly because she _was_ a nosy neighbor. She'd always enjoyed people watching and sometimes they gave her more than a show through the downstairs window.

Today, though, she watched them come out of their house, with Glenn carrying a large plastic container, and start down the street.

"What do you suppose their doing?" Dora asked Frank. Frank just grunted in response. Dora had been married to Frank for more than forty years. This was their normal type of interaction. Dora loved to talk. Frank was a man of few words. She always said it was fine because that meant that he didn't take up her time to talk.

She watched them go up the steps to the house that Daryl, Michonne, and Carol shared. Maggie knocked on the door and then a few minutes later they disappeared inside. They were going visiting.

Dora laughed to herself.

"They're going visiting, Frank." She said. "Can you imagine? Now we live in a place where people go visiting." Frank just grunted a response again. "I wonder what was in the box. What do you think could be in the box?" Dora asked it more to herself than to Frank, already certain he wasn't going to bother responding, which he didn't.

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"Mag!" Judith had squealed when they came into the living room.

"Hi Judith." Maggie said to her, picking her up. "What you got there?"

"Mine." Judith said, showing her the duck.

"Her speech is getting better." Maggie said. Carol was sitting on the floor cross legged. Daryl was lying on the couch with Hope on top of him, eating beef jerky. Michonne, who had opened the door for them came in and sat down by Daryl's legs.

Beth sat on the floor with Carol and Glenn put the box down and took one of the chairs. Maggie took the other that was in the living room.

"Her speech has gotten better, she's finally distinguishing between the two of us, but at least the name she chose for you is kind of cute." Michonne said. She reached in the bag of beef jerky that Daryl had and pulled out a piece.

"Yeah, I like Mag. Why, what does she call you now that you're not Ma anymore?" Maggie asked.

"Oh, I get to be Mush." Michonne said.

Daryl snickered. "Be careful you don't rip your teeth out with that jerky, Mush." Daryl said. "It's just one step away from being a belt."

"Then why do you keep eating it?" Michonne asked. She tried to bite the jerky but determined it was too tough for her tastes. She put the piece back in the bag.

"Hey, don't be puttin' pieces you drooled on back in there. That's rude." Daryl said.

"You're the only one who is eating the stuff, Daryl. Do you have a problem with my saliva?" Michonne asked.

"Good point." Daryl said.

"Ah the couple that fights over really old beef jerky is the couple that stays together." Maggie said.

"We wondered if you guys might want to play a game or something." Glenn said. "We brought a lot of choices."

"Why not?" Carol said. "Nothing with small parts, though. I don't feel like keeping after Judith because she wants to eat Monopoly houses or something."

"Well that certainly narrows the choices." Glenn said, digging through the box.

"We could play cards." Maggie said.

"We could play poker." Beth offered.

"Nope, not a chance." Glenn said. "I'm not playing poker ever with Michonne. Even if I knew she was playing with Jokers I'd fold every time just to be sure."

"I don't even know how to play poker." Michonne said.

"Doesn't matter." Glenn said. "You've got one hell of a poker face and I wouldn't want to take the chance. How about Uno?" He asked, digging it out of the box.

Everybody moved to get around the table except Daryl.

"You'll have to hand me my cards over here." Daryl said. "Hope's asleep and I ain't dealin' with her grumpy mood if I wake her up."

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Rick walked out on the porch to see if the rain had let up any. It hadn't. Across the street he could see two of the new people on their porch in rocking chairs. Rick hadn't gotten to know them yet. They seemed OK, though, just some old married couple.

Rick couldn't imagine that there would be too many old married couples in the future. Life didn't work out that way anymore. His certainly hadn't worked out that way. He thought that the other couples were foolish because it seemed like they really believed it that it might. Glenn and Maggie pretended that they'd be together forever and Daryl even talked about growing old with Michonne. He didn't really know if the other two young ones, Josh and Brenda, were like that because they spent so little time with the rest of the group.

Rick certainly didn't think about the prospect of growing old with someone. They all had an expiration date and no matter how much their current situation seemed ideal, it really wasn't. There would have to be runs, and they lost people on runs. Other groups could pass by and some of them might not even be as harmless as Earl, especially if they saw the life they were building here and decided they wanted it for themselves, and not in the manner of the people across the street who had just asked to stay. Eventually they would have to move on, and they ran the risk of losing people then.

It seemed like no one wanted to face that reality anymore, though. Now they'd all turned to Daryl as their leader. Some sort of mythical hero that was going to keep them from coming to harm.

Rick didn't really care that Daryl was trying to take charge now. At least no one was looking at him all hours of the day now, waiting for him to save them. Daryl still believed they could be saved, so they looked to him to save them. Rick was fairly certain that it wasn't a situation they could be saved from, essentially they were just buying time.

Rick wasn't getting close to Rachel. He didn't love her, she was just something to do. She helped pass the time on days like this when there was nothing else to be done. He had enough to worry about with Carl and trying to buy Carl as much time as possible. He didn't need to be worried about someone else that he'd eventually lose.

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Dora saw Rick walking around the porch. Over the past few days everyone had been opening up to her a bit more, and she'd even gotten Michonne to say a few things to her by asking questions about Hope. Rick, however seemed like a pretty closed off individual, and it wasn't just with her. It seemed like he was like that with everyone. He didn't engage in a lot of group interaction like the others did. He didn't even seem to interact with his little family.

The son, Carl, was a young teenager. He seemed to take after his father, not interacting very much with the group, but Dora wondered how much of that was influence from Rick. She had offered him some comic books that she found while she was helping to clean out a house, and he had seemed happy with those. She was sure not having his mother around was difficult, and it didn't look like the woman that lived with Rick was very interested in being a mother figure. Maybe that's what had happened with the baby, whom Dora still considered Carol's baby.

Dora decided she would try to keep finding little things for Carl. Maybe he needed a grandmother, and she would like to have another grandson, even if he was considerably older than hers would be.

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"So what do you think of the new people?" Maggie asked, trying to decide which card to put down.

"I like Dora." Carol said. "She's chatty, and she's a lot of help with the work around here."

"What about Frank?" Maggie asked.

"I don't know." Carol said. "I mean he doesn't talk much."

"I don't think that means anything bad about him." Michonne said. "He's just not a talker, and I doubt he was much of a talker before any of this happened."

"The boys are cute." Beth said.

"Yeah, I saw you making goo goo eyes at them." Maggie said, smiling. "Be careful you don't start some kind of war."

"I didn't think about that." Carol said. "There are two of them. Maybe you should talk to Sasha and see if she's interested in them. You could civilly decide between you which one you were going to take."

"Yeah." Michonne said, glancing up from her cards…she was taking the game very seriously and had won the last two. "You might want to talk to Sasha. She's mentioned that older one more than a couple of times going for water. The dirty blonde one, Jimmy? Apparently he's got very nice eyes. I can tell you, women can get pretty catty when they've set their sights on someone and you get in the way. I once had someone throw a plate of food on me because of something like that."

Carol laughed, remembering the day she'd intentionally dropped food in Michonne's lap after finding out about her and Daryl. It seemed like it was light years away.

"You know, now that you mention it, I did that one time. I was interested in this completely clueless guy. I never did make a move, because I thought that eventually he'd come around, but then this other woman came in and she just yanked the rug right out from under my feet. I knew I couldn't really do anything to her, but I did see her eating at a table once right after I found out about it, and I made sure to at least pretend to spill food on her."

"See?" Michonne said. "Women can be catty."

"Why do I get the feelin' y'all yackin' 'bout me?" Daryl said.

"I'll ask Sasha if she's interested. I like Junior better anyway." Beth said. "I wonder what his real name is."

"Mmm, just remember, I'm keeping my eye on you." Maggie said.

"And before you think you're going on any kind of date, this Junior fellow is going to have to come over and let us get introduced to him. We don't even know his family or what kind of people they are." Glenn added.


	39. Chapter 39

AN: Thanks everyone that's still reading. Thank you to all of you that review as well. I'm glad to know that you're still on board and still enjoying our little story. I'm still enjoying myself as well, so we'll keep going!

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"You were right, just a diaper problem." Daryl said coming back into the bedroom. "Where were we?" He asked Michonne, crawling into bed and kissing her.

"You were just driving me crazy." Michonne said.

Hope had impeccable timing. She could always tell the exact moment that would be the worst to start crying over something. The cry had not been a very urgent one, so Michonne knew it had to be about a diaper. It was best if Daryl handled those when they came in the middle of the night because Hope, even if she wasn't hungry, seemed to think that Michonne should feed her any time came in there and right now Michonne had other plans for her breasts.

Most of the other men that Michonne had been with were not attentive about foreplay. Her husband, _her first husband_, had pretty much considered kissing her and grabbing her ass sufficient foreplay, and she could remember thinking always that it would be nice for him to pay some attention to making sure she was ready for sex. Pay some attention to making sure that she was primed.

Daryl was vastly different. Daryl treated foreplay like it was a wine tour of Michonne's body. Although she found this very hot, he would kill her sometimes by taking his time to a point where she thought she'd explode. He'd also stop annoyingly from time to time to say something to her, something entirely unrelated to make her lose her concentration. The thing was, she could tell that he knew what he was he was doing. He enjoyed it, this torture was_ funny_ to Daryl.

Daryl loved everything about this time together. He loved Michonne's face when she was lost in the moment, he loved that she gave herself completely over to him. She was completely his in these moments, like nothing else mattered. He also loved the sounds that she made. He loved how annoyed she got when he would talk to her about whatever he was thinking about. She said it distracted her, he was trying more to distract himself. Seeing her so turned on didn't exactly make it super easy on him to wait it out. Daryl also loved the sounds she made. There were so many different ones, but there was one in particular that she made when she really wanted him. It was almost a purring sound and Daryl liked it best of all. That sound was his goal, and he tried to wait it to enter her until he'd managed to get that sound from her at least once.

"'Chonne…" Daryl started for about the fourth time.

"Stop talking. You know what you're doing to me." Michonne growled at him. She didn't want to hear about whatever it was he had just thought about. She was throbbing and felt like biting something, but Daryl was too far away to bite.

Daryl moved his hand between her legs. "Don't feel like you're too distracted to me." He said. She bucked at his hand trying to move against it. "Greedy, greedy." He said, smiling.

"Come on, Daryl." She moaned. She did feel greedy right now. Daryl was kissing the inside of her thigh and she moved her own had down relieve herself. He slapped it out of the way.

"Nope, my job." Daryl said, smiling again. She growled at him. Daryl nipped at the inside of her thigh.

Finally he got the purr that he'd been waiting on. He nipped her again and she repeated the sound. Daryl moved back up to kiss her again, finally positioning himself to enter her. He didn't want her to know that the purr was what he was always trying to get out of her. He was scared then that she'd just learn to make it on command, and then she wouldn't really mean it, and he might not like it as much. Finally he entered her, and she accepted him gratefully, like she always did.

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Michonne walked with Carol in the rain to get breakfast started. Even though they were safe, Earl was gone, and no one else appeared to be a threat, Carol didn't like walking down to headquarters by herself. She had asked Michonne at first to walk with her, and Michonne had agreed to, but now she didn't have to ask anymore. Michonne would just be there, silently waiting in the morning to go with her. They didn't usually talk much.

They got to headquarters and Michonne sleepily sat down in the kitchen while Carol tried to get together what she was going to prepare for breakfast.

"Sleepy?" Carol asked. She yawned, having caught the yawn from Michonne.

"Yeah." Michonne said.

"You got to bed a little late last night." Carol said. Michonne made a face and Carol smiled. "Just don't let on to Daryl that I can hear it and it'll be fine. He seems to think that the house walls are impenetrable and it's been clear since the prison that you just don't care."

Michonne shrugged. "I guess I just didn't figure it was any big secret."

"You know, I used to be very secretive about those kinds of things." Carol said. "I grew up in a household where we pretty much taught 'we just don't talk about it' and I guess I carried that with me. Now I don't know if it would bother me or not to know that someone else could hear me." She paused a minute. "You know, maybe I shouldn't have said anything about it. If it makes you uncomfortable, I'm sorry."

"Carol, you and everyone at that prison, even Carl maybe, saw me give birth to Hope. I think if I had even an ounce of modesty left it's gone at this point." Michonne said.

Carol snickered and went back to going through the cabinets.

"You ladies need any help?" Dora said as she came through the door.

"You can help open cans, if you'd like." Carol said. Dora smiled and walked over to help. "I'm guessing that at least Maggie, Glenn, and Beth will be coming down here. Josh and Brenda will need to eat. How about your household, do you think you'll all want breakfast?"

"I'm sure we will. Those boys are big eaters. They've gone through most everything you gave me to take down there." Dora said.

"I'll get you some more stuff to take down there after breakfast. With all this rain there's not too much to do to pass the time." Carol said. "I don't even want to know what Maggie and Glenn are cooking up."

"They're pretty energetic." Dora said.

"Maggie especially. She gets cabin fever very easily and she's got a little bit more energy than she knows what to do with when she's got activities to help her relieve it." Carol said.

"Jimmy and Junior are a little like that. I scrounged up some games and stuff for them to play with, but it sounds like they're wrestling upstairs half the time. I'm afraid they're going to tear the house down around us. Me, I just prefer to spend my time sitting on the porch, watching whatever is going on and reading some books that I found." Dora said.

Dora really liked Carol. The others she wasn't entirely sure about yet, but Carol just seemed so honest and so open. That was one reason that it made Dora particularly sad that Earl had done what he did to her. Michonne, who was sitting silently at the table behind them, was one that Dora wasn't sure how to read yet. She seemed…maybe it was cold…maybe it was distant…or maybe it was both. Still, Dora was sure there was something to her. Daryl doted on her, and she always seemed to accept his affections, often silently, but receptively nonetheless, and Carol seemed to care for her. Dora felt like there was something between the two women. There was an obvious bond there, though Dora couldn't imagine yet how you would form a bond with someone who practically never spoke. Still, it was there, and Carol seemed comfortable with Michonne's silences.

Carol said something that Dora didn't entirely hear. "Beg your pardon?" She asked.

"Did you find any good books?" Carol asked.

"Oh, heavens yes." Dora said. She giggled a little and lowered her voice as though there was anyone besides the three of them present. "I like those…what do you call them? The sexy books with all the tall, dark, and handsome men and the women falling in love with them…" Dora blushed a little.

"Romance novels?" Carol asked. She smiled. Dora clutched her hand.

"Yes, but I like the dirty ones." She said, giggling again. "With lots of juicy parts."

Carol smiled at her again. Standing there with her Dora clutching her hand that way, she remembered a moment. A good moment that she hadn't thought of in a long time. It was Thanksgiving, or maybe Christmas. She was cooking with her mother and two of her aunts. Her aunt Rue had been there that year and Rue was always a bit of a firecracker. A lot of the family regarded Rue as the family eccentric, or the crazy aunt. Carol had always loved Rue. You never knew what Rue was going to say or do. Usually, just before Rue disclosed some secret or uncovered some gossip about someone, she would take your hand, just as Dora was doing now, and then she would tell you whatever it was she had to tell you, often giggling and covering her mouth a little. _She had loved her aunt Rue. Carol had been very sad when Rue passed away, but she had some wonderful memories of holidays and Rue, uncovering all the 'shameful secrets' of the family_.

"Well, if you've got any good ones, pass them to me. I could use some romance in my life. I've got one that I've read about fifteen times." Carol admitted.

"Well if it's not one that I've got I'll borrow that from you." Dora said.

"Deal." Carol said. She could hear voices outside and knew that soon the living room would be filling up with restless, hungry bellies. It was time to get her family fed.

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"Do you think her eyes look different?" Daryl asked. Hope was lying on the floor "singing" to them and kicking her feet. Daryl was lying on his stomach next her, playing with one of her toys and kissing her at intervals, making her cackle.

"They're getting lighter." Michonne said. "Babies eyes change as they get a little bit older."

Carol sat on the couch with Michonne, holding Judith who was sucking her thumb, her duck tucked in the crook of her arm, and rubbing Carol's neck with the other hand. She was humming to herself, trying to take an impromptu nap. Carol always knew that Judith was sleepy when she snuggled into her and started rubbing her neck. The humming was a guarantee that she'd be out soon.

"Do you think Beth is going to end up going after that boy Junior?" Carol asked.

"She might." Michonne said. "I noticed Sasha making small talk with Jimmy over breakfast."

"We got some predators in this bunch." Daryl said grinning. "Them poor boys won't know what hit 'em if'n they go after them like you come after me, 'Chonne."

"You didn't give me any choice, Daryl. If I'd waited on you to make a move you'd still be brooding around and snapping at me whenever you got frustrated." Michonne said.

Daryl knew it was true. He probably wouldn't have ever gotten up the guts to tell Michonne what he was feeling if she hadn't kissed him in the watch tower. He was very happy that she had kissed him, that she'd known he just needed her to kiss him so he'd be sure.

"Do you think Hershel ever had the talk with her?" Carol asked. Judith had stopped humming now.

"I don't know, but I'm pretty sure that she has a good idea of what's what. I mean the prison was a hot house for sex education." Michonne said.

"I mean I know she's heard it, but I didn't know if he actually talked to her about it." Carol said.

"Well, I'm not explaining the details." Michonne said. "And I offered a live demonstration of what happens if you don't use birth control, so I say just let her figure the rest out for herself."

"She seems like such a kid for that kinda thing." Daryl said.

"She's over 18 by now, I think." Carol said. "By that time I was married."

"How old were you when you got married?" Michonne asked.

"I was 17." Carol said. "Nobody had the talk with me and I was surprised on my wedding night."

"You were a virgin on your wedding night?" Michonne asked.

"Yep. And I don't think Ed was very good at any of it. I never felt compelled to make many of the sounds that I heard in the prison." Carol said.

"I don't think I wanna hear this conversation." Daryl said.

"Oh don't be getting shy now, Daryl, with as much as I know about your sex life, don't act like you can't handle some tiny details about mine." Carol said. "How old were you when you got married?"

"I was twenty two." Michonne said. "And I wasn't a virgin."

"When did you lose it?" Carol asked.

"Aw man, I'm trapped in chick hell." Daryl said, looking uncomfortable. This was the first time that Daryl really realized he was the only man in this house.

"Don't pretend that you men don't talk about this stuff too." Michonne said. Daryl blushed. "I was fifteen when I lost my virginity. It was in the back seat of a car and from what I remember it wasn't the best experience I've ever had. Neither of us really knew what we were doing."

Carol looked at Daryl and smiled, a little bit devilishly.

"Ah hell no!" Daryl said. "I ain't talkin' 'bout this with both y'all starin' at me like that."

"Come on, Daryl, it's fun." Carol said. "We won't tease you."

"Yeah, Daryl, when did you lose your virginity?" Michonne pressed.

Daryl scrunched his face up and blushed. "I don't know. I don't wanna talk about it." He said.

"We told you ours, now you have to tell us yours." Carol said.

"Fine, but then you gotta quit raggin' me…damn women. I was thirteen, I reckon'." Daryl admitted finally.

"See? Did that hurt?" Michonne asked.

Daryl threw one of the toys he had at her and she dodged it, laughing at him.


	40. Chapter 40

Michonne found Daryl on the far side of the community, going house to house with Rick, clearing Walkers out of some the final houses. Hope wasn't with her, so Daryl reasoned that she must be with Carol.

"Hey sexy." He called as she approached.

"Hi there, handsome." She called back. Daryl smiled at her. He waited for her to get there, and reaching his arms out to her he pulled her to him, kissing her.

When the broke apart, Michonne smiled and gazed at him for a minute before speaking. "I wondered if a big, strong man such as yourself could help a poor, weak, woman like me out for a little while."

Daryl pinched her and she yelped a little, still smiling at him. "You know you ain't no weak woman." Daryl said.

"OK, you got me there, but I do still need the help if you can pull yourself away from Walkers for a bit." She said.

"Hold on." Daryl said. He went into one of the houses, and finding Rick, informed him that he'd be back later to help him clear bodies out. He trotted back to Michonne and they started in the direction of headquarters. "What's up?" He asked.

"Well, we were picking through houses and we realized just how much stuff we're finding. Some of these people had more money than they knew what to do with, which is good for us, but Carol's got a lot of organizing to do. So she's come up with a storage plan. She's taking over the house across the street from headquarters and she's using it completely for storage. That means that there are two steps involved in her plan, one is to move all the furniture out of that house and put it in the one next door. The other is to bring all the bookshelves from the other houses, which Carl is hunting down now, to that house to give her extra shelves and storage areas. We need your "muscley" arms to help out with that." Michonne said.

"Sure, no problem." Daryl said. "We should have gotten Rick to come along too." Daryl said.

Michonne made a face and Daryl knew what it meant. Rick was getting better. Slowly he seemed to be returning to the Rick that Daryl had known before Lori died, but it was a slow transformation. Daryl thought that perhaps having relieved Rick from much of the stress that Rick had been under had helped him a lot. It was stressful when everyone was looking at you, expecting you to tell them how to live, expecting you to give them some kind of solution to a problem that you really had no idea how to solve. For Daryl, it was stressful at times, but he liked getting everyone's opinions, having everyone involved, and letting them see that he was going to do the best he could by all of them, but that he was essentially in the same shoes as everyone else. He wanted to figure out some magic solution, but that didn't mean that he would, and it certainly didn't mean that he could guarantee the safety of everyone. He couldn't even guarantee the safety of those that he loved more than he even loved himself. He thought that maybe some of Rick's problem had stemmed from not feeling like the others could handle knowing that the person they looked to for answers could admit that he didn't have any answers, he just had, essentially, suggestions that they happened to like. Rick had always seemed to feel, in Daryl's opinion, that he had to handle it alone and that if any of those suggestions failed, for whatever reason, it would have been his fault.

The removal of this stress was allowing Rick to maybe work through some things he hadn't worked through before, and he was getting better, but Michonne was still leery of him, and Daryl knew that. In her opinion it was better to let Rick continue killing Walkers, blowing off steam and spending some alone time inside the houses rather than working with the rest of the group on putting together Carol's vision. Daryl understood, and wasn't going to push it.

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"I swear it looks like I need to be directing traffic or something." Dora said to Carol. She and Carol had been relieved of doing heavy lifting and instead were packing up boxes of the small items that they didn't need from the house to be carried over by the others to the neighboring houses. It was taking a while because this was apparently a household full of people that had loved to collect useless things. _Or at least now they seemed useless_.

All around them was the constant hustle and bustle of back and forth. People carried things out and encountered people who were carrying shelves in for the already cleaned out rooms. It did seem that they needed some sort of traffic cop.

"It's chaotic, but they're efficient." Carol said, putting things in boxes.

The only people not helping were Rachel, who was on babysitting duty, Frank, who had been excused because of an old back injury, Carl, who was running up and down streets checking cleared houses for shelves that Carol could use, and Rick, who was still finishing up with the great Walker clean out.

It was coming along nicely and Carol was excited about her new storage facility. They were finding so much, which was a great thing, and the added space was much needed if she wanted to be organized enough to make her life easier.

The sequence of fast thuds and the final crash caught everyone's attention that was in the house. Carol looked up from what she was doing, pausing for a minute. Maggie's howls brought her to her feet and followed by Dora she rushed into room where the howls were coming from. Maggie was squirming around a little at the foot of the stairs, lying in a bed of items that had apparently come from the box that she'd been carrying. She was howling in pain.

Michonne and Sasha had been carrying out a piece of furniture together, which they had promptly put down, and now they were trying to figure out what was wrong with her.

"Is anything broken?" Carol asked.

"I don't think so." Michonne answered. "Maggie, does it feel like anything is broken?"

Maggie kind of felt like _everything_ was broken. "I don't know." She said. "My arm is killing me, and my back is too."

"That was a really good tumble she took." Sasha said.

"Well, you're moving around, so I don't think your back is broken. Your arm has a pretty good gash on it. Something stabbed into it." Michonne said.

"If you can get her up, get her next door and I'll clean up the gash." Carol said.

Maggie wasn't in the mood to try to get up just yet. Sasha darted out the door and found Daryl and Tyreese hauling a bookshelf down the street. She stopped them and they put it down, following her back to the house. Tyreese gently picked Maggie up and followed Carol across the street. Dora trailing behind them to see if she could be of any service while the others went back to work.

Once Carol could really check Maggie out, the external damage didn't look too bad. She was probably going to be sore, and there would be bruising, but mostly she had scraped her back somehow in the fall and whatever had stabbed into her arm had left a gash. It really wasn't all that long, but it was deep.

"I can stitch that up." Carol said.

Dora, held Maggie's hand and tried to comfort her a little while Carol went to get what she needed. Glenn came in a moment later, word having finally gotten to him, and he rushed over, taking Dora's seat. He kept brushing the hair out of Maggie's face and comforting her. He looked panic.

"What's wrong with her?" Glenn asked. "What happened?"

"I was at the top of the stairs, carrying a box of stuff and when I tried to go down, I don't know what happened. I guess I missed a step or I stepped wrong. I don't know." Maggie said. "I just felt like I knew I was going to fall, and then I did. The rest I don't really know about."

"She's going to be fine, Glenn." Carol said, sitting back in her place. "She just needs a couple of stitches and she'll be fine."

Carol stitched up Maggie's arm while Glenn tried to distract her. Dora just watched them all. When Carol was done, she bandaged the wound.

"Glenn, give Maggie some pain medicine and take her back to the house. She's off duty for the day. Maggie, get some rest, but try to keep moving around every now and again so you don't get too stiff." Carol said.

Maggie and Glenn both thanked her before they left. Carol sat there for a minute and Dora joined her shortly.

"So what don't you do around here?" Dora asked. "It seems like you do so much."

"I try to keep busy." Carol said. "I try to pull my weight. I do the laundry, I get the food on the table, I take care of babies, offer comfort when I can, I administer birth control, offer therapy if needed, and try to fix whatever boo boos they bring to me…oh, and I helped deliver a baby."

Dora snickered. "Wow, they're lucky you know how to handle those things. What did you do before all this? Where you a nurse or doctor or something?"

Now it was Carol's turn to snicker. "I was just a housewife…and a mother."

"How do you handle the medical things?" Dora asked.

"I learned to do stitches because Hershel taught me. I just helped him deliver Hope because he wanted me there. I'm somewhat certain I could probably remove a bullet from a minor bullet wound, but other than that I have no idea what I'm doing. They just think I do, so I do what I hope is right and hope for the best." Carol said.

"Who was Hershel?" Dora asked. Maybe Hershel had been Carol's husband's name.

Carol smiled a little to herself, remembering that Dora didn't know Hershel. For a moment she felt a twinge of pain, missing him. She smiled again, remembering Hershel. "He was a very good friend." Carol said. "He was a vet, and he got us out of a few sticky situations, but most of all, he was a very good friend."

Dora felt sorry for a minute, realizing that they had obviously lost Hershel, whomever he was, along the way. It was never easy to lose people, and it never had been, but it seemed especially hard to lose them now. Once upon a time Dora had always asked everyone "how did they die" when she'd heard about a death. You could get a wide variety of stories, some of them tragic, but many just owing to the tricks that time played on us. Nowadays it wasn't so much like that. You didn't ask how people died because you didn't _want_ to know how they died. You didn't want to hear about it because it was most likely not anything less than horrifying. You also didn't ask because it wasn't fair. It wasn't fair to rip open someone's feelings, especially when you didn't know how deep the scar ran or how close it was to healing.

"I'm sorry." Dora said.

Carol smiled at her, and put her hand and top of Dora's. "Don't be sorry. Hershel's gone, but he was a good man and he lived a good life. No one should be sorry to talk about him."

Dora noticed a crack in Carol's voice and thought she saw a tear brimming in her eye.

"Should we get back to work?" Dora asked. Carol nodded and they went back across the street to help the others.

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"I mean I don't got nothing against the boy, don't get me wrong, but I want to know if he's the right kind of man for Sasha." Tyreese said. He was helping Daryl carry a bookshelf toward headquarters and they had quite the distance to go still.

"He's 'bout the only man for Sasha." Daryl said. "So if you ain't got nothin' 'gainst him then I'd say he's probably just right."

"I'm just saying that as Sasha's big brother I feel responsible for checking him out and I don't even know what to ask him. I mean I can't really ask him about his family, because no matter what they were like I guess it doesn't matter anymore. I can't ask him how he's doing in school. I know he doesn't have a car. His job title is whatever the fuck we're doing that day. I know where he lives. I just don't even know what I'm supposed to ask him." Tyreese said.

Daryl didn't have a sister. He'd never had a sister, and he certainly didn't have a baby sister. Out of the two new boys, Beth and Sasha had settled on their prey. Daryl didn't exactly see any romances flaming out of control between them. Mostly they shared idle chit chat and some flirty looks at meals, but as far as he knew there hadn't even been any first kisses yet. He didn't know what he could tell Tyreese to ask. Tyreese, though, had taken over a kind of fatherly role for his little sister, and Daryl could kind of understand what he was going through when he thought ahead to the future. If Hope grew up and was big as Sasha and was wanting to talk to some boy, he'd probably want to know more about the boy, but he wasn't sure if he knew exactly what he wanted to know.

"Well, ask him if he hits on women." Daryl said.

"What?" Tyreese asked.

"Ask him if he hits on women. Ask him how he likes Sasha." Daryl said. "If he likes Sasha and he don't hit on women, then I guess it's 'bout as good as it can get. We know he can take care of her, he made it this far and they just been wanderin' around for a while."

"He could lie about whether or not he thinks it's OK to hit women." Tyreese said. "And he could lie about how he feels about Sasha, if he feels anything yet."

"It ain't like he's got a whole buncha options, no offense meant to Sasha nor nothin' I mean she's a cute girl. If'n he don't feel nothin' yet, he will." Daryl said. "And if he decides he likes to go hittin' on women, shoot him." Daryl said.

Tyreese laughed. That's why you went to Daryl with problems like this. In these times, those uncomplicated answers were the most useful. Trust Jimmy if you think he's worthy of trust, give him some time to feel his way out, and if he turns out not to be worthy of your trust, then you simply shoot him. That's all. If he didn't treat Sasha the way she deserved to be treated, the new sheriff in town had already declared his sentence. Either you act decent, or you will be eliminated.


	41. Chapter 41

Daryl sighed, reaching his hand between Michonne's legs again. She echoed his sigh. He was getting frustrated, and he knew she was too. No matter what he tried, no matter how many times he tried it, she just wasn't in the mood and he was starting to really get frustrated with the situation. _He was in the mood, but she just wasn't. _He'd tried every button that he knew to push, even the things he knew she liked best of all.

"I told you, Daryl. Don't worry about me." Michonne said. She just couldn't get her mind in the right place for some reason tonight and it felt like this had been going on for hours. Honestly she was tired and just wanted to sleep, and that would be a lot easier when Daryl was ready to sleep.

"Yeah, but you ain't even tryin'." Daryl said in an almost whiny voice.

"I _am_ trying, Daryl, but it's just not working. Go get the bottle of stuff out of the bathroom." Michonne said. She wasn't getting up. It was cold and far too cold to traipse around the bedroom naked. Carol had given her a look the day that she'd come in the supply room with various bottles of lubricant that she'd found and started dropping them into supply boxes. She'd told her that if they had luxuries available to them, they might as well use them. Carol hadn't missed that she'd dropped a bottle in her box too. _You know, just in case_. She had told her.

Daryl got up and went to the bathroom. Michonne leaned up to watch him. On his way back he stopped at the foot of the bed, holding the bottle.

"I just don't like it." He said. "It ain't real."

"No, Daryl, it isn't real, but it does make it more comfortable for both of us." Michonne said. Daryl was just standing there. "Come on." She prompted.

"It feels like you're just sayin' you want me to get this over with and you don't even wanna do it." Daryl said. Michonne sighed.

"That's not what I'm saying, Daryl. What I'm saying is that I need a little help, but I'll still enjoy it." Michonne said. Daryl made a face. "Anything but the puppy face." Michonne said, dropping dramatically onto her pillow.

Michonne knew that Daryl needed a lot of encouragement and a lot of reassurance from her. It was like he had a confidence tank, or a love tank, and the tank got low at intervals. When it got low, she had a lot of work to do to build it back up. She had to reassure him that she was there, that she wasn't going anywhere, and above everything else that she loved him entirely. It was true. She'd never loved a man like she loved Daryl, she hadn't even thought that kind of love could be possible. It was the kind of love that people talked about but she had always seen it as unattainable.

Now here was the man she loved so much, standing in front of her, wearing the face that let her know that the tank was almost empty. He had a look of total betrayal on his face…betrayal and sadness. It was as if, instead of saying essentially "hey, let's make love but how about we use this because it'll make it more comfortable" she had said "I don't love you anymore, Daryl, and I never want you to touch me again."

He didn't say anything or do anything, he just stood there with that look on his face. Michonne pushed off the covers and crawled to the foot of the bed, sitting on her knees in front of him.

"Hey, you know I love you, you made me get out from under the covers." Michonne said. It wasn't enough to get rid of the puppy face. "Come here, Daryl." She said, reaching a hand out to him and pulling him to her. She took the bottle out of his hand and then pulled him down onto the bed. "Listen, I _do_ want to be with you, and I _do_ want to make love to you. I just can't get to the right place right now, but that doesn't mean that I don't want to be close to you, as close as I can get." She kissed him. "All this is going to do is make it more comfortable for me to get just as close to you as I can. That's all."

Daryl responded to her by kissing her again. The puppy look was gone now. "I love you, 'Chonne." Daryl said.

"I love you too, Daryl." Michonne said, smiling at him. "Now, can we get back under the covers, please? I'm freezing."

Daryl crawled back under the covers and Michonne joined him. She kissed his chest and stroked him, hoping he was distracted enough for the moment to not even pay attention to her fumbling with the bottle under the cover. He didn't seem to notice. She smiled at him. He had his hands folded behind his head and his eyes were closed.

_I guess I'll take care of this._ She thought to herself, still smiling at his facial expression. She straddled him and eased herself down on to him.

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MIchonne came out the door with Hope and saw Beth carrying a box and talking to Junior. She smiled at them. The budding romances were cute. Of the two new couples forming, it was like no one knew what they were doing, and each had taken on its own dynamic.

Sasha and Jimmy were definitely taking it slow. Whenever Tyreese was around the two of them, he often assumed the same countenance as a bear. Michonne thought it was cute because Tyreese normally had more of a teddy bear personality than a grizzly bear personality, but you could definitely see the grizzly come out whenever Jimmy would do something as innocent as touch Sasha's hand or shoulder. It was going to take a while for that relationship to come into full bloom because Jimmy was going to have to wait it out until Tyreese was ready to accept that Sasha was all grown up, and maybe didn't need to be lorded over so much. Michonne thought she might bring it up to Daryl to have a talk with Tyreese about letting up a little on trying to scare Jimmy to death. The boy was already a little gun shy when it came to Sasha, the added pressure wasn't going to help either of them out much.

Maggie had told them all what happened when Junior, who was apparently very old fashioned or was either acting under the advice of Dora, had come to their house one evening after dinner to formally ask Glenn and Maggie if they minded his courting of Beth. Maggie said that Glenn had tried to play the role of the overprotective father, but hadn't been very convincing at it. Even though they'd both given their blessing to the union, Michonne didn't think much had come of it yet, other than the hand holding and quick kisses they seemed to enjoy. Once Michonne had seen him put his arm around Beth's shoulder, but that was about the most physical advance that she had seen.

"You're up late." Maggie called, approaching.

"Hope let me sleep a little this morning." Michonne said.

"Can I hold her?" Maggie asked, reaching out her arms.

"Sure." Michonne said. She passed Maggie the baby and adjusted the jacket that Hope was wearing a little. Hope smiled at Maggie and Maggie kissed her forehead before settling her against her hip. "Where is everyone?"

"A bunch of people are helping Carol organize things in the stock house. Some of the others are going through houses. There's so much stuff and still so many houses. We might need to clear another house before long, especially if we decide to start doing any outside runs." Maggie said.

They both started toward the stock house.

"It's good that we've got so much, though, we don't have anything to really worry about this winter." Michonne said. Over the past month or so they'd been hard at work preparing for winter, and the cold had really settled in on them now. Everyone stayed busy, but the pace had slowed a little. The fact that they were realizing that they didn't have much to worry about made work more about passing the time and less about a frantic rush to find out what they didn't have enough of.

When they arrived at the storage house, Michonne went to the sorting room and took a box. The first step was to sort each of the incoming boxes into the categories that Carol had designated other boxes for. Then those would be taken and put away in the areas designated for each kind of thing. The system that she had established was a really great system and Carol was thrilled at how organized everything was slowly becoming.

Carol was the happiest that Michonne had seen her in a long time. Judith was not only growing like a weed, but she was _thriving_ and it was done mostly under Carol's nurturing. Motherhood looked good on Carol. She wore it well. Instead of getting annoyed with any of Judith's toddler antics, Carol seemed to enjoy them all. Judith was becoming a mastermind at removing her clothes, and Carol never got annoyed, she simply put them back on her, scolding her as best she could and reasoning with the child that she was going to freeze her "tooshie" off if she didn't leave her clothes on.

Carol also had a dutiful assistant in most everything she did. She had gotten close to Dora, and Michonne was always amused when she caught glimpses of Dora mothering Carol. Michonne had come to really enjoy Dora. She was so positive, so bubbly and uplifting. She was a difficult person to _not_ like. She just sort of won you over even against your will.

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Dora was beginning to love this place, and she realized she was beginning to love the people that she had come to know here. This group really was a family, flawed as it may be, and she felt like they were making room for her to join that family. The boys, who she regarded as her boys, were beginning to twitterpate with the girls in the group, and their shy advances were fun to watch. The group was even beginning to accept Frank, her old grump, into the fold, if as nothing more than a slightly crotchety old uncle who said little to anyone.

The atmosphere here was an atmosphere that Dora had never imagined she would see again in her life. Everyone was happy and light. The only time there was ever concern was when someone went for water. The anticipation was high on the outside of the fence, and when you went for water, you worried something might happen and you might not make it back to your happy home. When you weren't the one that went for water you mentally counted the minutes in your head that the small group had been gone, worrying that something would happen to them out there and that they might not come back to the gates, asking to be let in. That was when they worried, but other than that, they were mostly worry free, and that was a good feeling.

Dora had even noticed that Rick, who had seemed to be the most reclusive of the group, had started interacting with them more. His face was often much more relaxed than it had been when she'd first arrived, and she'd even seen him laugh and share a joke or two with Daryl and Tyreese. Maybe he was getting relaxed too.

The best news of all, in Dora's opinion, was that they were realizing how long they could realistically stay here, and it sounded like it was a good long time. They hadn't even begun sending people out on "runs" as they called them when they discussed it, and Daryl had strategically picked this town so that they would be surrounded by other towns that they could get to relatively easy.

It was exciting to think that they might make it out of this. She was beginning to think again that she might get her wish to die in her bed, an old woman. What warmed her heart even more at this point was that she could imagine, just a little, dying an old woman in her bed, surrounded by family and friends. She had thought before how bad it would feel if she lost Frank out there and then she died, with no one who loved her left.

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"Let's take a walk across the street for a minute, Michonne." Carol said after they'd been working for a while.

Michonne got up and checked on Hope, who Maggie was wearing around while she worked. The baby was asleep, and Maggie was fine with her, so she followed Carol.

"What's up?" Michonne asked.

"Nothing, just need to do something." Carol said.

When they got there, Carol told Michonne to go into the conference room and she'd be in there in a minute. Michonne went and sat on the couch to wait.

"You're about to not like me very much." Carol said coming into the room, carrying a bottle of rubbing alcohol.

Michonne realized what Carol was up to.

"It hasn't been three months." Michonne said.

"Yes it has, I've been keeping track on a piece of paper in the kitchen. I got everyone else after breakfast. I thought you might prefer doing this alone, though, since Maggie can't laugh at you this way." Carol said.

"I want to talk to you first." Michonne said. Carol sighed.

"I've gotten even better. Rachel said so." Carol said. "I know you're just stalling, but you're just giving yourself more worry time."

"No, I'm serious." Michonne said. "I want to talk to you."

Carol could see in Michonne's face that besides the nervous look of someone fighting with a phobia, there was a certain urging there. She sat down in the couch beside Michonne and put everything on the coffee table, except for the syringe which she put beside her and out of Michonne's line of vision.

"OK, what do you want to talk about?" Carol asked.

Michonne was quiet for a few minutes, like she knew what she wanted to say, but she wasn't sure exactly _how_ she wanted to say it.

"Daryl wants us to have another baby." Michonne said.

"Do you want to have another baby?" Carol asked.

Michonne was silent for another minute. "I think I do."

"Have you thought about this, Michonne?" Carol asked gently. Michonne gave her a look. Carol snickered. Of course Michonne had thought about this. There was very little that Michonne said or did without thinking.

"We're safe here." Michonne said. "We're going to be here long enough for me to get through the pregnancy and have some recovery time."

"Maybe more than that." Carol said.

"If we travel in the vehicles I can ride in the car to feed when I need to. We could avoid what happened last time. If we have two and it comes down to foot travel, Daryl can carry one and I can carry the other. We can share the responsibility." Michonne said.

"That's true. It's a lot of responsibility, though, if it comes down to that." Carol said. "That means worrying about two instead of just one."

"I have thought about that too. If we do keep on going, Carol, and we do figure out a way to make this life work out for us, though, then there will be a future for Hope and for Judith. We don't know what will happen with everyone else, or who we'll find or they'll find out there, but at least if I had one more they'd have some family to depend on." Michonne said.

"And we don't know, I mean someone else might feel compelled eventually to start their own family if things continue like they are." Carol said. "Maybe they'll just be the next generation." She thought for a minute. It was odd to think that they had forgotten for a while about the possibility of future generations, of a future entirely.

"I don't want to wait too long, Carol. I want to make sure we'll be here long enough for the pregnancy and long enough for me to get my strength back so I'm not a drain on the group. I also don't want to wait too long because I'm not as young as I was, you know?" Michonne said.

"How old are you?" Carol asked.

"I'm not really sure, Carol, but I'm old enough that the amount of time I've got left to be planning babies is limited." Michonne said.

Carol nodded her understanding to Michonne. She didn't know how old she was anymore either. She doubted sincerely if anyone could answer that question.

"I tell you what." Carol said after a few minutes. "I'm guessing that Hope is about six months old, give or take. Why don't we dose you this time and give your body a little more time to recuperate, then next time if you're still set on doing this then I won't dose you again. You can just let it wear off and before you know it you'll be barfing in the bushes."

"Ugh." Michonne said, making a face.

"You also get some time to think about the unpleasant things you'll be repeating." Carol said. She stood up and patted the couch. "Here, pants down and lie down. We'll get this over with."

Daryl had stepped in the door at that moment.

"What is going on in _here?" _He asked with a snicker. Michonne unbuttoned her pants and lie on the couch.

"Just torturing your bride." Carol said. Daryl watched her give Michonne the shot.

"I wish you wouldn't do that." He said.

"We've already had a conversation about your future offspring." Carol said. "You're waiting three more months."

Daryl made a face at her but didn't say anything.

"What do you need, Daryl?" Carol asked, unsure if he'd come for her or Michonne who was now refastening her pants.

"I came to tell ya that we done filled up the area you designated for soap and we need ya to tell us where you want us to keep puttin' it."

"That's a decision you couldn't make, Daryl?" Carol said. Michonne snickered.

Daryl scratched his head. "Well, yeah, I mean I can point to some shelves if ya want me to, but since it's you that's gonna be tryin' to find everything later I figured you might want to do the directin'."

Carol smiled at him. "We're on our way over now." Daryl turned and headed back out the door.

"I swear, sometimes I think that the easiest decisions are the hardest things for some of the people around here to take action on." Carol said. Michonne followed her into the kitchen while she put things away.

"Sometimes it's like that." Michonne said.

Carol stopped for a minute. "Michonne, I don't know how to deliver a baby. I mean I helped Hershel a little, but I wasn't really paying attention. I don't really know what to do."

"Well, when the time comes we'll just let my body tell us what to do." Michonne said. "People have had babies without doctors for centuries."

Carol nodded. She turned around and smiled at Michonne, squeezing her arm. "You're right. Let's get back to work and solve their epic crisis."

Michonne smiled and followed Carol back across the street.

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"You warm enough yet?" Daryl asked, walking around the bed and adjusting the blanket he'd piled on top of the already large mound. He'd been looting as many of them as he could out of houses, and trying to get the pile large enough to satisfy Michonne, who apparently had no ability to absorb heat.

Michonne giggled at him, she was still lying under the pile. They'd been talking and upon her shivering Daryl had gotten up and started producing extra blankets from a box he had in the corner.

"I'm warming up a little." She said. Daryl slid back under the cover and pulled her back up against him.

"I think you just gave me sheet burn." Michonne said.

"Sorry." Daryl said.

"Back to what I was saying, Daryl." Michonne started. "It's not that I'm trying to be mean or deprive you or anything. Believe me that I would love to give you everything that you ever wanted or dreamed of, but one more baby is my limit."

They had hashed and rehashed this argument a hundred times, but only shallowly. Michonne had decided that tonight it really needed to be addressed instead of just ignored and put away, since Daryl had become very excited to know that Michonne was seriously discussing their second child with Carol.

"First off, it's not practical. I think we can handle two children. We're strong enough together that we stand a pretty good chance of protecting them." Michonne said. Daryl silently listened to her, tracing his finger up and down her arm. "Secondly there are the logistics of it. It's physically demanding to grow a baby and to give birth to it, not even mentioning the taking care of it after it's here. I don't think I'm as young as you think I am, and I know I'm not as immortal or indestructible as you think I am." Michonne continued. There was still no response from Daryl other than the continued tracing. "After a certain age it's harder for a woman to have a baby, more complications can happen. There could be bigger threats for me and for the baby. If the baby came early we don't have any way to save it. Daryl, I don't think I could handle that if I were in a situation where I knew we just had to wait for it to die. I couldn't handle just waiting and watching our baby die and knowing that there wasn't anything I could do."

Daryl leaned up and rolled Michonne onto her back. He leaned over her.

"Why didn't ya say somethin' 'bout that before?" He asked. "I don't want that. I don't want nothin' hurtin' you 'Chonne, and I don't want nothin' happenin' to our kids."

"That's why I think it's better if we just have the two and throw in the towel, Daryl. I know you always thought you'd have four, but I'm just not the woman that can give you that." Michonne said. "I wish I could, but I don't think I'd feel comfortable doing it."

Daryl kissed her and lied back down. She rolled over so that she could face him.

"I wish you'da said somethin' before." Daryl said. "I wouldn'ta ragged you 'bout it so much."

"It's OK, Daryl, I'm not mad about you ragging me. I just wanted you to understand that it's not that I just don't want to consider what you wanted, it's that I just don't think it would be good for any of us if I did." Michonne said. Daryl slid his head closer to her and kissed her again.

"It don't matter, 'Chonne. I reckon' two is just as good as four, I mean two is a good number." Daryl said.

Michonne smiled. "Two is a good number, Daryl. I'm sorry that you have to change the family in your head so much."

"I like this family better anyway." Daryl said. "This one is really mine. The other don't really belong to no one."

They lie there a few minutes in silence.

"What we gon' name him?" Daryl asked after a minute. Michonne giggled.

"Daryl, you do understand that I have zero control in whether or not our second child is a boy or a girl, right? I mean you've got a fifty fifty chance of having another daughter or of having a son." She said.

"I done told ya 'Chonne, mine come out even, and even if there's only two, they still gonna come out even." Daryl said.

Michonne smiled again. "Alright, assuming it's a boy, what do you want to name him?"

"I don't know." Daryl said. "I ain't thought about it."

"Well, did any of the kids in your head have names?" Michonne asked.

"Nah, they was just sorta there, you know? They didn't have no names or nothin'." Daryl said.

"Well then you've got time to think about it. You might want to consider some girl names too while you're thinking about it." Michonne said.

"It's gonna be a boy." Daryl said. "I know that much."

"Daryl," Michonne started after a minute, "what did your wife look like in your head?"

Daryl didn't say anything.

"I know what my wife looks like, 'Chonne." Daryl said after a moment.

"I know that now, but the one in your head, the one that _could_ have your four children, what did she look like?" Michonne pressed.

Daryl didn't say anything.

"Come on, Daryl, tell me. I promise that I'm not going to be jealous over a woman that you made up in your head. I just want to know what your imaginary wife looked like. Did she have a name?" Michonne pressed.

"No, she ain't had no name. Like the kids she was just sorta there." Daryl said.

"What did she look like?" Michonne repeated, rubbing a finger on Daryl's chin. He kissed it when she ran it across his lips.

"I don't know. She was kinda like them women in the black and white t.v. shows." Daryl said. "She had froofy hair and she wore a lotta dresses." Daryl said.

Michonne giggled. "What color was her "froofy" hair?"

"Blonde, but dark blonde." Daryl said.

"What color were her eyes?" Michonne asked.

"I don't know, I didn't get that detailed with her. I just know she liked me alright and I was good to her 'cause I didn't hit on her never." Daryl said. "I like what I got a whole lot better than I liked her, though." Daryl said.

"You're a good husband, Daryl." Michonne said after a minute of just looking at him. He smiled, that genuine smile of thanks that he gave her when she'd said something that meant a lot to him. "And it's more than the fact that you don't hit me. You're just a good husband all the way around."

"It's easy to be a good husband when I got me a wife that I love so much." Daryl said. "All I gotta do is do exactly what I want to do for ya." He kissed her, and rubbed her face.

"Let's get some sleep, Daryl." Michonne said. "I don't want to sleep through breakfast again tomorrow." Daryl smiled.

"Roll on over." He said. "I'll warm ya up so as you can sleep."

Michonne rolled over and snuggled against Daryl. She must have drifted off before him because she never heard him start to snore.


	42. Chapter 42

Carol had not forgotten about her promise to Maggie, and the granddaddy longlegs that she found cowering and half frozen in the kitchen cabinet was going to be perfect. He was just "deadly" enough to scare the pants off of Maggie, but he promised no real harm to anyone. Carol had trapped him there all day in anticipation of her attack.

They were all sitting around the dining room after dinner. So much body heat had made the room actually quite warm and no one really wanted to leave it, so random conversation had been their choice for the evening's entertainment.

Carol came in from the kitchen, having excused herself to go and make sure the fire was out completely and to take the dishes outside to be washed the next morning. When she came in, she shuffled her way around the crowded room, apparently making her way back to her seat. She stopped behind Maggie and put a hand on her shoulder. Maggie turned a little to look at the floor, assuming that Carol must be using her as a support to step over something.

"I've got a little something for you." Carol said, dropping the spider on Maggie's lap.

No one had expected Carol's attack, and they certainly didn't expect what happened next. Maggie in a terror stricken panic, shoved back her chair and tried to get up, screaming. She'd knocked Carol to the floor, who was laughing so hard that no sound was even escaping her. Maggie's foot caught on the chair and she fell back on top of Carol. Floundering hysterically and screaming "Get it off! Get it off!"

Carol couldn't breathe she was laughing so hard. She hadn't expected to end up on the floor with Maggie on top of her, hitting her in her attempts to get the spider, who was probably already dead from heart failure or had lumbered off somewhere, off of her. It was worth it, though, Carol thought, just for the absolute hilarity of the moment. No one had moved to help them or even ask if they were OK because everyone was still dying from laughter over Maggie's reaction.

Dora was finally starting to get her breath. She didn't know _why_ Carol had put the spider on Maggie, but it had been the best show she'd seen in a while. She didn't know if this was just something Carol did from time to time, but Maggie had certainly not been expecting it.

When Michonne could finally get control of herself, she got up to assist the two of them. Carol still hadn't stopped laughing and was gasping for air. Maggie was jerking around frantically, still trying to find the spider, convinced that it threatened certain death for her if she couldn't locate it.

"Where is it? Where is it?" She said when Michonne reached down to pull her up.

"Probably dead." Michonne said.

"Probably dead? That's not good enough." Maggie said. Now her hysterics were calming a little, but she was starting to cry.

"Calm down, it's not on you. There's no way it's on you. It didn't survive your departure from the table." Michonne said. She pulled Maggie up, but she was shaking and kept jerking. Michonne quickly checked her over. By now Tyreese came over, helping Carol up, who still hadn't completely quit laughing.

"It's not on you." Michonne said. "You're clean."

"It was a daddy longlegs." Carol said, still giggling a little. "Not a black widow."

"I HATE you!" Maggie screamed, red in the face. Michonne instinctively grabbed Maggie's arms. Not sure if Maggie might react in a way that she'd regret once she calmed down. Maggie shrugged off her arms, turned and shoved past her, making her way out of the room. A minute later they heard the front door slam.

Glenn, who had been blankly watching the last part of the scene stood up.

"That was really mean, Carol." Glenn said. He was guilty of having laughed too, but now he felt really bad for Maggie. She was really upset because she did hate spiders.

"She'll be fine, Glenn." Carol said. "And she doesn't really hate me. It was mean, but Maggie needed to be reminded that we have to respect each other, especially about the things that frighten us, because even if it's not serious to anyone else, it's serious to that person. She knew it was coming."

Glenn looked mad for a minute, and then his face calmed. "Well," he sighed, "I guess I better go calm her down." He left the room without bidding goodnight to anyone.

"It was mean." Carol said, not really to anyone in particular. "I guess I'll apologize to her tomorrow."

"It was mean," Daryl said, "but it was funny as hell." He laughed again. "Man when she shot up from that chair it was _on_." Everyone laughed again.

"Does anyone know where the spider went?" Beth asked, looking around.

"Off somewhere to die from a heart attack." Carol said. Everyone laughed again. "Don't worry, Beth, I'm not going to do anything to you."

"See there," Sasha said, "I told Maggie that was bad karma, and bad karma _always_ catches up to you!"

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The next day all was forgiven over breakfast. Carol apologized to Maggie, and Maggie, having finally calmed down had taken back her statement about hating Carol. She was still a little jumpy, though, every time Carol got close to her.

"I told you." Carol said when Maggie jumped as she put her plate in front of her. "I'm not going to do it again. Are you going to tease anyone about overreacting about their phobias anymore?"

"No ma'am." Maggie said. "I get it. You can't help how you act when you're faced with something you're scared of."

"You're a quick learner." Michonne said. Maggie snorted.

"Well at least you got your laugh at me. Don't think I didn't hear you laughing." Maggie said.

"Sorry, but it was funny. If I had flipped a chair and took Carol out I don't think I would have minded you laughing." Michonne said.

"Michonne," Carol said, interrupting. "Do you know of any stores nearby that y'all could make a safe run to for formula and really any kind of baby food stuff that you can get your hands on? We've only found a little bit in the houses so far. It doesn't seem like too many people around here kept much of that stuff stockpiled."

"If I remember correctly, there was a little mom and pop variety type store that shouldn't be too far from here. It's a short run, and unless it's been terribly picked over it should have some stuff for Judith." Michonne said. "Do you think baby food and all would still be good?"

"I honestly don't know. If they have powdered milk, can you get some of that too for making rice cereal? I'm almost out of it. I'll try the food before I give any to Judith." Carol said.

"You're going to voluntarily give yourself food poisoning?" Maggie asked.

"I'd rather I got it than she did." Carol said. "At least I could understand what was happening to me."

They'd run into the occasional problem with food, but luckily no one had gotten majorly sick over anything. These days it was just try it and hope for the best. Michonne thought they might be building up some sort of immunity to it, though, since it hadn't happened in a while.

"Glenn and I can go right after breakfast and get that stuff, if you want." Maggie offered.

"I'll go with you." Michonne said. "I can tell you how to get there. We'll take Beth so in case we see anything she can get a little more practice in."

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Glenn pulled up in front of the store that Michonne had directed him to. It looked to be like some kind of family dollar type general store. "I hope I don't get towed by parking here." He said, switching off the engine.

They'd seen quite a few Walkers, and some were ambling around the streets and parking lots around them. They were hoping that the cold weather might keep them from paying them much attention.

"OK, listen, it's a quick get in and get out." Michonne said. "No dawdling. When we get in there, Glenn you and Beth keep watch and Maggie and I'll get the stuff."

"Deal." Glenn said.

"Ok, let's go." Michonne said. They all got out quickly with their bags and rushed into the store, walking right through the doors that had been broken out.

The store had been looted, that was clear, whether it had happened when everything started or it had been done by a group passing through, but hopefully it hadn't been too badly looted.

Everyone took their places and Michonne and Maggie rushed to find what they needed. It took them longer than they anticipated to find the powdered milk and then they headed toward the baby aisles.

Beth and Glenn came barreling down the aisle toward them.

"We've got company! A whole lot of it!" Glenn said as he rushed by. Instinctively Michonne and Maggie dropped everything and ran after them. At the back of the store Glenn saw a door and said a quick prayer that it would take them out the back. He ripped it open and ran in, and the others followed him with Maggie shutting the door.

Once inside the door they searched around in the darkness hoping for some kind of exit. There wasn't any kind of exit. It was just a storage space, apparently.

"Well this is just fantastic." Michonne said. "How many Walkers are we talking, Glenn?"

"Enough that running into a storage closet seemed like a really good idea." Glenn said. "I don't know, at least as many as we saw that night…," he stopped for a second, "when we were travelling. It was like all of a sudden they just smelled us." Glenn was sure he'd been right before. They were moving faster than they used to.

"Do you think the others would come for us? I mean if we stay in here and wait?" Maggie asked. Beth was crying and it was grating on Michonne's nerves.

"Stop crying, Beth." Michonne snapped. The others _would_ come looking for them if they didn't come back, Michonne knew that much was true, but it could take them forever to find them, and even then they'd have to take on the herd. Realistically that door wasn't going to hold out a herd of Walkers, they'd push through it easily, and then they'd just be trapped in the storage room with the Walkers.

"Do you think the door will hold until they get here?" Glenn asked.

For a moment Michonne felt sad. They were just trapped like rats here right now, and she desperately wanted to be back in the safety of their community. She wanted to hold her daughter, and she couldn't imagine what Daryl was going to do if she didn't make it back. She tried to shake the thought out of her head.

She wasn't giving up this easily. She'd be damned if she was going to just sit here and wait, like a sitting duck, for Walkers to get to them. Michonne unsheathed her katana.

"Is everybody armed?" She asked. Everyone responded in the affirmative.

"Then fuck this. We're going home. _All _of us." She said.

Glenn had frozen a moment when Michonne had opened the door and run out. Then he snapped out of it, running after her, his machete in hand.

Michonne had thought she had bitten off more than she could chew until she saw Glenn to the left of her, fighting right along with her. At least they were fighting. She hoped Beth was ready for this. She didn't know how many Walkers were in the store, or how many more were still spilling in, but at the moment she felt like she had when they'd walked out into the prison yard to find the Governor's collection ambling around. She fought furiously, trying not to think about where the others were.

At one point Michonne stepped backwards and her foot hit something, she didn't know if it was a fallen Walker or some discarded item on the floor, but she slammed backwards, her katana flying out of her hand. She scrambled to try to retrieve it, one Walker getting particularly to close for comfort. She was surprised, however, when the Walker fell dead on top of her, and Beth was standing there yanking her hatchet out of its skull.

Michonne scrambled to her feet and, having retrieved her katana, helped Beth with the ones closing in around them.

As it waged on, Michonne felt like they were playing some sort of fast paced Whack-A-Mole game with Walkers spilling toward them from the various aisles of the stores. She didn't know how many more were coming, but she prayed they were getting close to whittling down the numbers.

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_They have been gone too long_. Carol thought to herself. She was getting antsy, but she was trying to hide it from everyone else who obviously hadn't been paying attention to the amount of time that the group had been gone.

Carol had sent Tyreese, Sasha, and Dora out to get water and she tried to occupy herself by building a fire to boil the rest of the water that they had left.

_They're going to want baths when they get back_. Carol thought to herself. _If they ran up with Walkers they'll be wanting to get clean. I'll make sure they come back to hot water._

When the water crew got back, and the group still hadn't returned, Carol got even more worried. It was getting late. They should not be taking this long. This was a ridiculously long time to be on what was supposed to be a relatively short run.

"They're not back yet?" Sasha asked, putting down her bucket and helping Dora with one of hers.

"No, not yet." Carol said. She was trying to hold her voice steady and keep her face relaxed. If they saw she was worried, they might freak out. Though she did notice that the three of them already wore slightly concerned faces.

"Does it usually take this long?" Dora asked. She didn't know what a "run" consisted of, though the group talked about them often.

"Hard to say." Carol said. "We haven't done many since we got here."

"When we were at the prison they could take all day." Tyreese said. He could tell that Carol was a little anxious and he wanted to calm her down, but he had to admit that he was worried too. When they'd done runs at the prison they had to go to other towns. This was a run that was supposed to be just a few streets away.

"We should start getting something to eat ready." Carol said. "They missed lunch and they'll be hungry."

"I can help you." Dora said.

Carol went with Dora to start getting cans of food ready. She had hoped the activity would distract her, but it really wasn't helping much. When Daryl found them, he had an unhappy Hope with him.

"She's gettin' fussy." Daryl said. He hadn't paid attention to the time until the baby had started to get restless. Now he was wondering where the group was.

"What do you want me to do about it, Daryl? I can do a lot of things, but I can't start lactating on command!" Carol snapped at him. She hadn't meant to snap at him, but she was on edge.

Daryl jumped back a little. Shocked that Carol had spoken to him like that. "I wasn't sayin' you needed to do nothin' 'bout it!" He snapped back. He could tell she was worried, and he was worried too. Michonne was out there, along with the others, and now his baby was letting him know they'd been gone too long.

"I'm sorry, Daryl." Carol said after a minute. "I just…I just…I don't know what to do right now." She took Hope from him and walked out of the house, leaving Dora to finish gathering cans. Daryl followed behind her.

"Where you goin'?" He asked.

"To get a pacifier." Carol said. "It's all I know to do right now." Carol said.

"Do you think we oughta go get 'em?" Daryl asked. Still keeping a few paces behind her.

"I don't know, Daryl. I don't know what to do." Carol said.

Now Daryl was really worried and really didn't know what to do. What he wanted to do was get in the car and go and find them. He didn't know where they were, but he still wanted to go and find them. He suddenly felt like he couldn't breathe. He didn't even know where they were and he needed to find them. He needed to find them alive.

Tyreese saw Daryl stop in the middle of the street. He looked like he was struggling to breathe. Tyreese ran over and put his arms on Daryl's shoulders.

"Take it easy, man." Tyreese said. "We're gonna bring them back. We'll get the car and we'll take a group and we'll bring them back." Tyreese wasn't entirely sure it was a good idea to take Daryl with him at this moment, but he knew that Daryl wasn't going to stay there if they went in search of the group. He knew that Daryl would be worried about Glenn, Maggie, and Beth, but his real concern right now was finding Michonne.

Daryl didn't say anything. He honestly felt like he couldn't talk at this moment, but Tyreese had sounded positive about what he had said and it was a little comforting.

"Let's see, we can go. We'll take Sasha, she's one of the strongest fighters we've got here. What about Rick?" Tyreese said.

"Yeah, Rick's good." Daryl said.

"Hey! Hey!" They heard Sasha yelling at them. They could see outside the car approaching. Both of them ran over to the gates to help Sasha get them open and to kill the Walkers that were trying to barge in.

Carol came out the house to see them opening the gate. She took off in a run.

"Are they all there, can you see all of them?" She called.

When the car stopped they were all crowded around it. Everyone climbed wearily out of the car. They were all covered in blood and every other disgusting thing imaginable, but they were standing. Everyone froze for a moment, just staring at them. They looked at them like they thought they were ghosts or some kind of vision they were having.

"You can get the bags out of the car. I'm beat." Glenn said meekly.

That snapped everyone out of it and despite the fact that they were filthy, they all found themselves being embraced.

"Bites? Scratches?" Carol asked immediately.

"No bites." Michonne answered. "I honestly don't know about scratches.

"I'll get water for everyone. Daryl, you help Michonne and check her for scratches. Maggie and Glenn, check each other out. I'll help you, Beth." Carol said, snapping into action.

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Daryl helped Michonne get washed up and he checked her thoroughly for scratches. While she was twisting at her hair. Finally satisfied that she was scratch free, Daryl hugged her.

"I was gettin' scared 'Chonne." He said.

"Believe me, you weren't the only one that got scared today." Michonne said. She walked into the bedroom and started getting dressed. She still hadn't fed Hope and that was terribly obvious to her right now. She was also starving.

"We was just about to come lookin' for y'all." He said.

"I knew you'd eventually come looking. Don't worry about it anymore. We're all here. Let's go get something to eat and I'll give Hope what she's been wanting, I know she's not happy right now." Michonne said.

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Everyone was sitting around, waiting for dinner to be ready. Glenn had been recounting the events of the day. The fight that, for them, had been an epic battle. They had all fought continuously, and it was only when they stopped coming and only a few were left that any of them even began to entertain the thought that they would make it out of there. Now that they were relaxing, Daryl had scooted his chair right next to Michonne's and had his arm around her, pulling her to him.

"I'm telling you." Glenn said. "It was like the herd the Governor let loose on us but it was just the four of us."

"They were everywhere. I couldn't even get my machete out of one hardly before another one was grabbing at me. It was terrifying!"

They were all exhausted, but Michonne imagined that if they felt like she did, they were somewhat energized as well. There was a lot of adrenaline still coursing through them. They would crash tonight, that was for sure.

"I never thought I'd get to say this, but Beth saved my ass out there today." Michonne said.

Beth was blushing. "I saw you go down. I didn't know what else to do."

"Well you did well, I'm proud of you." Michonne said. She had seen a side of Beth today that she hadn't seen before. Beth had fought, and Beth had fought hard. When her back was against the wall, Beth had the potential to blossom into quite the warrior for the group. Michonne was pleased. Finally Beth had found the drive to face her fears.

Carol brought in food and served the four of them first. They were all starving, so they accepted it gratefully. Most of the meal was silent, with a few comments thrown in here or there, and immediately after eating Michonne excused herself to go home and go straight to bed. A full stomach was enough to make her really realize how tired she was.

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"Go to sleep." Michonne said to Daryl. "I don't think you realize how dog tired I am right now. I don't want to talk."

This had been a sort of slap in the face for everyone. They felt safe in their little neighborhood. It felt like nothing could happen to them. They were living in their own little utopia here, but today had reminded them all that the utopia did not extend beyond the fences that surrounded the community. Outside the fences the chaos was still raging. It had gotten to all of them, and for Daryl it had been like someone splashing him with a bucket of ice water. He had a lot on his mind, and he wanted to talk about it, but Michonne wasn't interested in talking about anything right now.

"Fine," Daryl said. "Go to sleep. I guess it can wait until tomorrow." He snuggled up against her, holding her extra tight. "I love you, 'Chonne." He said.

"I love you too, Daryl. Goodnight." Michonne mumbled.


	43. Chapter 43

At breakfast the stress and strain of the day before was obvious on everyone's faces. It was obvious for those who had faced the thought of never returning to the community and it was obvious on all those that had contemplated, at least for a moment, the possibility that in one day they could be down an entire household of loved ones and short one in another household.

Carol was not exempt from this number. It had hit her already the impact that the loss would have had on the group. Daryl would never have abandoned Hope, not as long as he lived, she was sure of that, but he would have needed help and Carol would have had to provide that.

Her family needed something. They needed some kind of pick me up, and so did she. She'd thought about it while preparing oatmeal.

"So we've got a busy day ahead of us." She said when the last person was served and she could sit down to eat the food that she didn't enjoy, but ate to keep on top of things. Everyone turned to look at her. She'd become responsible lately for giving out jobs and most people were attentive to whatever she had to say. "Everyone needs to bundle up. We're going to be outside a lot today." They continued to look at her, no one commenting yet. "There's a house a couple of streets over that has a very nice paved area and a basketball hoop. Do you know which one I'm talking about? It's in front of their garage."

Most of them nodded.

"Good. I need several of you to go and find chairs. Take them there for whoever wants them. Maggie, Glenn, do you have a basketball and a football in your collection of toys?"

"We have a football." Glenn said, looking a little confused. "No basketball."

"Go get it." Carol said. "We're having a play day. We all need it and I've decided to force you all to have it."

The group didn't look like there would be much forcing involved. The prospect of a relaxing day sounded nice to everyone after the stress of the day before.

Everyone started coming together near the house that Carol had designated. Jimmy and Junior had brought chairs for Dora and Frank, who weren´t participating in the fun, but wanted to watch. Maggie and Glenn had brought far more than a few balls, offering a variety of entertainment. It looked more like it was going to be like recess than anything else.

Most of the group was happy with a football and they jogged down the street a little to set up what was going to be their football field and to decide who would have who on their teams.

"Let me see that baby." Dora had said to Michonne. She'd immediately started kissing Hope, having previously discovered that the little girl was wildly ticklish, and making her laugh. Carol was entertaining herself with a hula hoop.

"I haven't done this in years." Carol said. "I'm terrible at it, but I always thought that one day I'd get the hang of it. My sister could keep it going for ages."

"I never was any good at that either." Michonne said, watching Carol.

"Any basketballs?" Tyreese asked, walking over to them. He'd been burrowing through the pile of toys with Carl.

"Not at the moment." Carol said, "But I bet there's at least one in the garage. You wouldn't have a hoop like that and not have a basketball."

"I'll get it." Carol said, heading toward the garage.

"Carl, wait!" Rick called after him, seeing him headed for the closed garage. "Did anyone clean out the garage?" Rick called back to Carol.

"I don't know, Rick." She said.

Rick went to the garage with Carl, and stepped in first to take care of any possible Walker lurking in there. Michonne was glad to see that he had thought to do that. Rick was calming down more. He had begun to watch Carl again, instead of just leaving the boy to his own devices and the protection of the clan. It made Michonne wonder if, as he continued to come around, he was going to develop an interest in Judith, or if she'd been completely forgotten by him.

Judith, at this moment, was acting like she'd been completely forgotten by Carol, which wasn't the case at all. Carol just didn't want to hold Judith right now and Judith was standing a little out in front of her, clutching her duck and reaching one arm toward Carol.

"Caw! Caw! I hold you!" Judith kept calling. In a moment, Carol would abandon her failed efforts at the hula hoop and hold the child. She would often let Judith beg to be held for a little while, but not too long. Judith usually was content to follow her around while she was working, but she'd learned quickly to distinguish between a Carol that _couldn't_ hold her and a Carol that _wouldn't _hold her and there was one that she simply could not abide.

"Hey, look at this!" Carl called, wrestling a bike through the side door of the garage. It had a baby seat on it. He rolled it down the driveway to them. "It's got helmets too." He said. He looked at Carol. "Do you think I could take Judith for a ride?"

"I don't see why not." Carol said. "Bring the helmets."

Carl dashed up the driveway and came back a few minutes later with the helmets, his already resting on his head and carrying one for an infant.

"I don't know if it'll fit." He said, handing it to Carol.

"I'm sure it will be close enough. Just don't go doing any Evil Knievel stuff to test it out." Carol said. Carl smiled at her. "Ok, go ride around a few minutes and get your "wobblies" out." Carol commanded.

"Wobblies?" Carl asked, picking up the bike.

"With most things we know how to do and we never forget how to do, we are still pretty wobbly when we try to start doing them again after a long break. You need to ride around a few minutes and get over those wobblies. When you're confident on the bike again, I'll buckle Judith in for you." Carol responded.

Carl got on the bike and started to ride it in the street. He was, in fact, wobbling. They watched him as he turned the corner.

"Wobblies, huh?" Michonne said. Carol shrugged.

"What else was I going to call it?" She put the helmet on Judith, and slipping her finger between her chin and the clasp, snapped it. "It's not perfect, but I think it'll do the trick."

Michonne saw Tyreese headed for the garage in search of the basketball that Carl had completely forgotten about. She followed after him, wanting to have a talk with him.

"Did you ever think that Sasha might appreciate it if you'd quit cockblocking Jimmy?" Michonne said, stepping into the dark garage with Tyreese. He turned around. He hadn't been aware that she was behind him.

"Did you just say I was _cockblocking_ Jimmy?" Tyreese asked. He couldn't believe Michonne was talking to him, much less talking like that. He talked to Daryl a lot, but he'd not really had too many conversations with Michonne.

"You know that's what you're doing." Michonne said. She'd seen it the effect when they were all making their way over her and Jimmy, making a move like he might put his arm around Sasha, had stopped and dropped his arm, realizing Tyreese was behind them.

"Help me get this door open, shine some light in here." Tyreese said, fumbling with the garage door in the dark. He didn't want to have this conversation with Michonne, but he certainly didn't want to have it in the dark.

Michonne helped Tyreese and together they pushed up the door. He immediately went to looking for a basketball. These had not been very tidy people.

"I mean what are you afraid of? Do you think her reputation is going to be ruined? We're not exactly a judgemental society when it comes to hooking up. It doesn't even matter if they find out they don't have anything in common besides the sex." Michonne said.

Tyreese didn't say anything. He really didn't like to think of his little sister having sex with anyone.

"She's my little sister." Tyreese said after a minute.

"She's still a woman." Michonne said. "And I don't think Sasha is as innocent as you'd like to think she is."

Tyreese continued looking for the ball. Michonne was pretty good at reading people, and she could tell that Tyronne was a little uncomfortable with the subject. She didn't know if it was that he was uncomfortable about talking about Sasha having sex, whether it was about talking about sex in general, or whether it was talking to her that was getting to him.

"Ah ha! Got one." Tyronne said, emerging from a bunch of things in the back corner of the garage and walking out with the basketball. "OK, I'll go easy on them." He said.

"You know it could be good for her." Michonne said. She looked at Tyreese and tilted her head to the side. "It could be good for you too."

Tyreese wasn't really sure what to think right this minute. Michonne had just very obviously checked him out. He gave her a confused look.

"Oh, calm down." Michonne said. Realizing that her quick examination of Tyreese may have thrown him the wrong idea. "Not me! I've got all I can handle with Daryl. I was just window shopping for a friend." She said, smiling.

Tyreese could tell that Michonne had something up her sleeve. He had never expected to really see that look on Michonne's face, but he'd seen it before on plenty of other women. Michonne was thinking something, and it was most likely something naughty.

"Who?" He asked, lowering his voice even more than it already was.

Michonne turned her head and looked down at the street where Carol was talking to Dora. Tyreese followed her gaze.

"What? Who? _Carol_?" Tyreese said.

Michonne looked at him, wrinkling her forehead a little. "What's wrong with Carol?" She'd lowered her voice too.

Tyreese looked back to Carol. She was laughing at something Dora was saying.

"Well there's nothing _wrong_ with her." Tyreese said. "I mean, it's Carol. She's not really my type, and I've never really thought of her that way. She's so much a _mother_. I've never seen her be anything else."

"I, for one, have learned that types before this and types now are quite different." Michonne said. Andrea certainly hadn't been her type, and she'd have never imagined herself with Daryl before all of this happened. "Daryl wasn't my type, but I think he's pretty much ended up being the best type for me now. Carol's role in the group is very mothering, but no one's given her any opportunity to be anything else."

Tyreese glanced back towards the group. He'd never thought about it before, but now he was certainly entertaining the idea a little, which was obviously what Michonne was going for.

"Think about it." Michonne pushed. "If she's that attentive to your wants and needs at the dinner table, just think about how she'd be…"

"Ah, ah, ah! Stop!" Tyreese said.

Michonne smiled at him. "Think about it. I could help you out…if you need it." She said. She turned to walk away.

"Wait up, aren't you gonna play?" Tyreese asked, bouncing the ball on the pavement just outside the garage door.

"No, I'm going to get in on the football game." Michonne said, turning back for a minute.

"What the hell? Am I supposed to play by myself?" Tyreese asked. Michonne motioned her head towards Carol and smiled again, turning finally and jogging off in the direction of those that were playing football.

Tyreese bounced the ball a few more times and then walked down the driveway to where Carol was talking with Dora and Frank.

He cleared his throat as he joined them.

"Do you play?" Tyreese asked Carol, holding up the ball as a type of explanation. Carol smiled at him.

"I'm not good at basketball, but I'm not too shabby at Horse." She said.

"Fair enough." Tyreese said.

Carol looked back at Dora. "Can you keep an eye out for Carl and Judith?" Frank was holding Hope who had developed a very serious interest in the old dog tags that he wore.

"Sure, you go have some fun." Dora said.

Carol turned and followed Tyreese up the driveway toward the basketball goal.

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Seeing Michonne approaching Daryl called a time out to the small bunch. They stood there until she got to them.

"Can I be on your team?" Michonne asked Daryl.

"Well now," Daryl said. "Before I let you on my team, I'm going to have to ask you a few questions to figure out if you're better suited for my team or for Rick's." He grinned at Michonne.

"Ok, shoot." She said.

"Do you absolutely suck at football?" Daryl asked.

"I'm pretty bad." Michonne admitted. Daryl nodded his head a little.

"Do you feel like you can barely move, like you're at least seventy to eighty years old?" Daryl asked.

Michonne thought about it. She was still exhausted and her back and arms were sore. "Probably pretty close to that."

"Would a Walker be a more effective quarterback than you would be?" Daryl asked.

"Possibly." Michonne said.

"One final question," Daryl said, his grin broadening. "Could Judith cover you successfully?"

"It could happen." Michonne said.

By now there were giggles and snorts coming from the others.

"Then you can be on my team." Daryl said. "You'll fit right in."

Daryl's team consisted of Maggie, Glenn, and Beth, whereas Rick had Sasha, Junior, and Jimmy.

"Fine. Let's play." Michonne said.

"Now the teams aren't even." Rick said.

"Does it matter?" Daryl asked. "I mean you've seen us playing out there. We'd be more effective if we traded some people for Dora and Frank. One of your people could tackle three of mine _at once_."

Rick laughed. "I guess you're right, we're not really close in score or anything."

They huddled with their teams, took positions, and went back to playing what was probably the worst football tournament in history.

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"And here's the surprise I promised." Carol said coming into the dining room. She had a box, and it just happened to be a box full of pudding that she'd been secretly stashing away for some time in the storage area. "There's enough for everyone." She said, passing it around and passing out spoons.

Daryl, who was holding Hope took his, even though he had no intention of eating it. He would wait until everyone had one and then he'd pass his to Michonne.

"Hey, that's not fair." Sasha said. "When we played the last time, only the winners got pudding and I had to listen to Maggie's mouth. Now everyone gets pudding?"

"Yes, Sasha. Everyone gets pudding today. We're lucky that Maggie's still here for us to hear her running her mouth." Carol said.

"Thank you, Carol." Maggie said. "Although I'm not entirely sure that was a good thing." She added.

Carol smiled at her. "It was a good thing, Maggie, it was a good thing."

Carol watched Maggie quietly for a minute as she peeled open her pudding container and licked the top. As much as Maggie had the potential to get on everyone's nerves, Carol couldn't imagine sitting here at the table tonight and not having Maggie sitting there, with her feet in the chair and her knees drawn between her chest and the table, a sitting position that she often assumed after she'd finished dinner.

Carol sighed and tried to put it out of her mind. They hadn't lost anyone, and that was what was important. It was better not to dwell on what it would have been like if they had lost someone.

Tyreese was distracted tonight. He was eating his pudding and he kept glancing over at Carol, aware that Michonne kept looking at him. Now she had him thinking about it. Carol wasn't at all the type of woman that he would have been likely to ask out before all of this happened, but maybe there was some truth to what Michonne had said about types changing. Tyreese didn't entirely like the idea of being alone. With the exception of the kids, everybody had _somebody_ now, except for him and Carol. Still, he felt bad thinking about it that way. If he did decide to make some kind of move on her, and she were to accept his proposition, he wouldn't want to feel like the only reason they were together was because there wasn't anybody left. It wasn't a flattering thought about either of them, even if there may be truth to it.

Carol was an attractive woman, a little too petite for his tastes, since he'd probably be afraid he'd break her if he hugged her too tight. She had a pretty face, and Tyreese did like her smile. The thing about Carol was that when she smiled, and she really meant it, everything about her lit up. She was very mothering to the group, to the entire group, but Tyreese wondered if there was any merit to what Michonne had said about her not really having the opportunity to try on more hats than that.

Tyreese looked at Michonne. She was looking back at him, half smiling and eating her pudding. _Damn it. She knows I'm thinking about it now._

Michonne could tell that Tyreese was thinking about what she had said earlier. It just made sense to her. Tyreese was a good man, and Michonne thought that Carol deserved that, or at least deserved a shot at it. Carol would never be the type to make a move, especially not on a man like Tyreese, but she may very well accept his advances if Michonne could work him up to making some. And anyway, she felt like she kind of owed it to Carol to find her a nice man, she had, after all, stolen Daryl, and that had been Carol's on prospect at the time. Michonne was satisfied with herself. She'd never played matchmaker before, but with only two candidates, she thought she might actually be good at it. It looked like Tyreese, even if he didn't decide to make a move, would at least be stuck thinking about the possibility for a while.


	44. Chapter 44

AN: Sorry about the Carol/Carl and Tyreese/Tyronne typos…these things happen to me. LOL

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Tyreese was not at all happy with Michonne. Since she'd mentioned the possibility of Carol, he hadn't been able to stop trying to imagine it or stop trying to wrap his mind around it.

Carol was attractive, and the more he thought about the possibility of something between them, the more attractive he found her. Also the more daunting the task of getting to what he was imagining seemed. She was so unlike anyone that he'd ever been with before.

Carol had always been so timid around him. She'd always done anything that she could do for him, but she'd always sort of backed away from him since he'd arrived. He was sure she was a little frightened of him, though he'd never given her any reason to be so.

He had thought she was with Daryl, the way she doted on him. Apparently Daryl was her type. _But how does anyone channel their inner Daryl?_ Tyreese thought. He wasn't sure he even had an inner Daryl to channel. He would often talk with Daryl and listen to him reason things out and he was always amazed at the way that Daryl's mind worked. He was so simple, yet he could be so complicated.

Daryl was a fumbler, a bungler at times, and he could be a little awkward. Tyreese wasn't sure he could be that at all. He hoped that wasn't so much the side of Daryl that Carol had found endearing or it could be problematic. What he did know was that Carol was not going to make any moves on him. She hadn't made any on Daryl, even though it was clear to the group that she was interested in him, and she certainly wouldn't make any on him since she hadn't indicated any sort of interest. This was all in his hands. _Though Michonne did say she would help me._ Tyreese thought.

Tyreese wasn't sure how he was going to get Carol's attention, or how he was going to proposition that she consider something with him, but Michonne seemed to think it would work. Maybe he'd talk to Daryl about it. Maybe Daryl had some insight. Carol wasn't familiar territory to him, and he was going to have to figure out the right moves to make if he was going to make any at all.

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"Daryl, what do you know about Carol?" Tyreese asked. They were on watch together and Tyreese had specifically set up the pairing, in hopes that he could get some Daryl insight on the basics of how Carol worked.

"Carol?" Daryl asked, walking along, checking the fences.

"Yeah, I mean, what's her story?" Tyreese asked.

"Well her little girl turned and we had to put her down." Daryl said.

Tyreese had heard the story about Sophia a few times from a few different mouths and Carol wasn't shy about mentioning her.

"She had a husband, Ed, who used to pound on her." Daryl said.

Tyreese hadn't thought about that before, thought it made sense sometimes considering her demeanor. Carol had been abused. At first the thought saddened him. She was pretty fragile and he couldn't imagine anyone choosing to beat her. He'd never understood that, though he'd known quite a few men in his time that beat their wives. They'd always seen it as a sign of their masculinity. As if beating your woman made you more of a man. He'd always thought it took more to walk away from something than it did to beat someone who couldn't or wouldn't defend themselves.

Daryl was quiet, intent on making sure that any of the Walkers they saw proved no real threat to the structure of the fences.

"How did you and Michonne end up together?" Tyreese asked.

"What'cha mean?" Daryl asked.

"I mean how did it all come down? I thought you were with Carol, and then we find out you're obviously not with Carol." Tyreese said.

"I weren't never with Carol." Daryl said. "'Chonne kissed me in the watch tower." He was smiling now. "It was after she got shot in the leg by the Governor's henchman."

"So what was your relationship with Carol?" Tyreese asked.

"We ain't had one other than I knew what she'd been dealin' with and I felt sorry for her. She's like a sister to me, has been since the whole thing with Sophia." Daryl said. "What's up, anyway, what's all this interest about me an' Carol? You sweet on her or somethin'?" Daryl asked.

"Maybe, Daryl." Tyreese said. "Maybe." Daryl smiled at him.

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"I think Tyreese is sweet on Carol." Daryl said to Michonne when they were finally settled in.

"Oh?" Michonne said, trying to hide her pleasure at hearing this.

"Yeah, he's askin' 'bout her and askin' 'bout us." Daryl said. "He was askin' 'bout if I had a relationship with her." Daryl said.

"What did you tell him?" Michonne asked.

"All the stuff you already know, 'Chonne." Daryl said. "That we ain't had nothin' goin' on other than I cared 'bout her like she was my sister and that she had lost Sophia and had a husband that beat on her."

Michonne listened to Daryl, knowing that he'd given all that he could give as far as information went. She thought she might have another talk or two with Tyreese if he was actually going to make an attempt at Carol.

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Tyreese wasn't sure where to go from here. The one thing he knew, from watching Daryl and from knowing Carol's backstory a little, was that he wasn't going to be too forward. He wanted to engage Carol, not frighten her. She needed to see that he wasn't any kind of threat.

Tyreese was starting to settle into the idea, into the possibility, and he wasn't displeased with any of the images that he was allowing himself to entertain at this point.

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"You want some help with that?" Tyreese offered to Carol. He wasn't on duty and didn't have much to do and he'd hung around looking for any kind of chance. He'd finally seen her struggling with what looked like a particularly heavy box that she was trying to carry from the storage house to the headquarters.

"Sure." She'd said, allowing him to take the box. It was more than a little obvious that he'd taken her off-guard.

Michonne was sitting on their porch steps with Hope. She'd been watching the nerf war that was going on between Maggie and Glenn for a little while, but now she was more interested in what was going on at the headquarters. Tyreese had been down there for a while, but he hadn't seemed to be interacting with Carol. Now that she saw them together in her head, and the picture had become quite clear, Michonne realized she was going to have little patience with the dance that was going to be starting shortly. She just wanted to push them together and say "I consider this done"…unfortunately she knew that's not how life worked. At least Tyreese was carrying stuff for Carol now. _Very good, Tyreese, now start a conversation._ Michonne wondered how she could move closer without catching their attention.

"I don't have much to do." Tyreese said. "If you need some help, I can help you."

Carol smiled at him. "Thanks. There's actually two more boxes that I was going to bring over to headquarters."

"I can get them." He said, going into the kitchen and putting the box on the counter. "Just point them out." As they walked back across the street together, Tyreese was trying to figure out his next move. He was usually good at idle conversation, but that was only once he really got to know someone. He was just realizing that he'd never had an actual conversation with Carol before that extended beyond thanking her for something or asking her for something. That was really how a lot of people interacted with Carol, they just asked her for things and thanked her when she gave them what they wanted.

Carol couldn't figure out why Tyreese was suddenly hanging around headquarters, offering to carry boxes for her. He didn't usually spend much time hanging out around there. Usually she was pretty much alone at headquarters during the day unless Dora wanted to come down and chat or Michonne was feeling like being in her company a little. Beth had once spent a lot of time with Carol, but now she had Junior to entertain.

"Where's Judith?" Tyreese asked.

"This is going to sound terrible, but I actually don't know." Carol said. "I mean I know she's with Daryl, but I don't know where Daryl is right now."

"That one." Carol said showing him a box on the floor. "I think that's the heaviest one. I can get the other one."

Tyreese bent down to pick up the box.

"You can leave it, I'll get it." He said. "I don't mind."

Carol left the box, but now she felt kind of dumb just following Tyreese around while he carried things for her.

"And that doesn't sound terrible." Tyreese said. "I think most mothers wouldn't worry much about their children if they knew that Daryl had them."

"Yeah, but Judith's not mine." Carol said.

Tyreese was pleased with himself. It worked every time with a mother. Just get her talking about her kid and she'll keep talking to you. He was glad that Carol had put down the other box. At least with her following him around like this carrying both boxes would gain him a little more time to talk to her without looking for an excuse. It would also give him a little more time to figure out what his next move might need to be.

"I think we both know that Judith's your child, whether you gave birth to her or not. Who feeds her?" Tyreese asked.

"I do, most of the time." Carol said.

"And bathes her?" Tyreese asked.

"Me, most of the time." Carol said.

"Who does she want when she can't sleep?" Tyreese asked.

"I know what you mean, Tyreese, but she's not mine. Rick could take her back anytime he wanted." Carol said.

Tyreese thought about it. Carol's voice had changed a little when she'd said that. He put the box on the table. He saw his window. He tried to be as nonchalant about it as possible and put a comforting arm around Carol. At first she had kind of acted like she would move away, having probably been caught off guard, but then she accepted it.

"I don't think that Rick would do that." Tyreese said. He really didn't know much about Rick, but he was becoming a much more stable person than he had been when they'd first come to the prison. Tyreese hoped that meant he had the ability to reason, and if he could reason then he'd know that Judith didn't really know him, and in Judith's world, Carol was her mother. She wouldn't understand being taken away from her now. "You're too good of a mother to her for him to take her back. She doesn't know him."

Carol smiled at him. "Thanks." She said. To his surprise, she put her arm around his back. "Shall we go get the last one?" She asked. She didn't move her arm, and Tyreese didn't offer to move his.

"Sure." He said, pulling her forward just a little with his arm, indicating that he intended to walk across the street with her, just like this.

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"Yes!" Michonne said when she saw the two of them come out of the house. They had their arms around one another and Michonne was almost giddy. Tyreese was good…he was real good. "This is so in the bag." She said to Hope who was sucking on her hand, completely unaware of what they were watching.

"What are you doin'?" Daryl asked, coming out of the house from changing Judith.

"Shhh…sit down! Don't draw attention." Michonne said.

Daryl sat down and held Judith in his lap. "Attention from what?" He asked. Michonne looked really excited right now and he had no idea why.

"Look, over there." Michonne pointed to Tyreese and Carol, who had now stopped outside the storage house. Michonne was a little annoyed that she couldn't hear a word that they were saying, but they were facing each other talking and Tyreese was nonchalantly touching Carol on the arm while he talked.

"Yeah. So?" Daryl said.

"So they're talking and he's touching her, and she's not stopping him." Michonne said, her voice low. "And keep your voice down." She added.

"I don't get it." Daryl said. Michonne swatted him. He lowered his voice. "What are you so excited about?"

"They're talking…look…now they're laughing. They're talking, and laughing, _and_ touching." Michonne said. Daryl was watching her more than he was watching them. She was unlike he'd ever seen her before. She was really into this right now.

"Yeah, but 'Chonne, why are you so excited about this?" Daryl repeated. He had to admit that this personality that was coming out, although foreign to him, was cute.

"I don't know how to explain it, Daryl. I'm just excited. I told Tyreese to think about it and apparently he did. And now he's managed in probably half an hour to go from 'we don't talk to each other' to 'I can make you laugh and I'm now allowed to touch you'. This is going so well. He's a master at this. I didn't know he'd be this good, and Carol seems to be warming up to him just fine." Michonne said.

Daryl shook his head. "Whatever, 'Chonne." He said. He didn't see the excitement of it, but Michonne certainly did. "We're almost out of diapers, I'm going to see if Carol's washed anymore." He said. He started to get up, but Michonne grabbed him by the back of his jeans and pulled him back down.

"Don't you _dare_ interrupt them." She hissed.

Daryl laughed a little. "OK, fine, I'll wait 'til your show is over." He said.

The two of them talked a few more minutes and then went into the storage house.

"Now can I go?" Daryl asked.

"No you may not. We don't even know what's happening in that house right now. You can go whenever they're done with this interaction. If that takes all day then we'll check when we go down for dinner." Michonne said.

"You just gon' sit here all day and spy on Carol and Tyreese?" Daryl asked.

"You know of anything better to do?" Michonne asked.

"I'm going to see what Maggie and Glenn might have to entertain me an' Lil' Asskicker." Daryl said.

"Fine, but stay away from Carol and Tyreese." Michonne warned.

"Don't worry, I ain't gonna interrupt your show." Daryl said. Michonne was intently watching the door of the supply house, but Daryl pulled her face to him and kissed her. She returned it, but briefly. Daryl laughed at her again. Michonne was Maggie level excited and he'd never seen it before. He figured he'd let her enjoy it.

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Tyreese had stayed with Carol after he carried the boxes. He'd offered to help her with dinner, brought her the wood, helped her get the fires going, and had busted up a few more pieces of furniture that they'd brought there to be used for the fires. He was trying to help her with anything that he could, and she seemed really appreciative of it.

Tyreese really didn't have a solid plan at this point. His plan right now was to keep talking to Carol, who was actually quite entertaining, and to keep coming up with reasons to touch her. She wasn't jumping now in response to his touching. He wasn't really an especially touchy person when he talked, but right now he was pretending he was, and she was accepting it.

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Michonne had decided that her the view would actually be better from across the street so she wouldn't have to crane her neck so much to see. She wasn't getting any of the dialogue from the interaction, but she'd been making it up in her head.

Tyreese had busted up some furniture for Carol, he'd helped her get the fires started, and now he was sitting with her while things cooked. Michonne was about to explode. She got up and darted over to Dora's house, which was on the other side of the road. Completely ignoring everyone playing in the street.

Dora was sitting on her porch, rocking and watching Glenn and Maggie when Michonne bounded up the steps. She grabbed the other rocking chair and drug it over to the side of the porch, facing it to look toward headquarters.

"Dora, look there. You've got to see this." Michonne said. Dora got up and adjusted her rocker to be beside Michonne's.

"What am I looking at?" Dora asked.

Tyreese and Carol had their backs to them, sitting side by side, and Tyreese kept touching Carol's back and shoulder at intervals.

"Carol and Tyreese." Michonne said.

"Oh, I was going to go help her cook, but it looks like she found someone." Dora said. Still not entirely sure of why they were watching.

"No, it's not the cooking." Michonne said. "It's what's cooking between _them_." Michonne said. "I think that there might be a little something going on between Tyreese and Carol pretty soon. I've been watching them all day."

Dora smiled at Michonne, but Michonne wasn't looking at her. She was watching the interaction with the same intensity that Dora used to watch her soap operas.

"Go for it, Tyreese." Michonne urged. "Just rest your arm on her shoulder now. She's ready for it."

Dora knew that Michonne wasn't talking to her. She wasn't really talking to anyone. She was trying to send telepathic messages. Dora had done that with the television. She started watching the interaction too. It was kind of interesting to think that Carol and Tyreese might start something. Watching them now they certainly did seem relaxed together. Tyreese, put his hand on Carol's shoulder again, and this time, he left it there.

"Yes!" Michonne said. If Tyreese could figure out how to get to one of those fantastic moments of silence where they were looking at each other, he was in the perfect position to go for that first kiss. Michonne didn't know if she'd imagined it, but she thought she actually saw Carol shift into Tyreese a little when his arm had remained resting on her shoulder. "Here, Dora, can you hold Hope?" Michonne said, passing the baby to Dora.

"Sure." Dora said.

"I think they're going to kiss, and I'm so excited about it. I don't want to accidentally hurt her or anything." Michonne said.

Dora laughed. She'd never seen Michonne excited. She'd seen her happy, but not excited. Dora was watching now too. It did look like at any minute they _could _kiss. Dora had never thought of the possibility of those two getting together, but she really did like Carol and if it made Carol happy, then she'd be happy about it too. Tyreese was a nice man, very well mannered. He'd probably be a good man to Carol, and Dora had found out from things Carol had mentioned to her in conversations that Carol hadn't known too many good men in her life.

The moment when Tyreese went in for the kiss and Carol didn't shy away from him, Michonne thought her heart would explode. She shot to her feet without thinking about it. "Yes! Yes!" She said, a little louder than she'd intended.

"What's going on with you?" Maggie called from the street.

"Don't mind her." Daryl said. "She's just gone crazy for a little bit. I think she'll be back later."

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Michonne didn't say anything to Carol about seeing the kiss, and Dora didn't say anything either. They were the only two that had witnessed the event.

At dinner Michonne watched Carol and Tyreese. They were cute together and it was obvious that they liked each other, Michonne was pretty sure that everyone else at the table was picking up on it. Carol was extra attentive of Tyreese tonight, and since they were sitting side by side, anyone observing couldn't help but notice their hands touch every now and again. Michonne was so happy about it she actually caught herself humming a little while she was eating, and tried to get that under control.

After dinner, Michonne rushed Daryl back to the house under the pretext of giving Hope and Judith a bath. She really hoped that Tyreese would stay around to help Carol with the dishes, and maybe they'd explore this a little farther.

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Carol's head was spinning trying to process what all had happened that day. At first she had been a little tense when Tyreese had touched her, but then she'd slowly realized she liked it. His touch was gentle, much gentler than she'd imagined, and he hadn't been pushy about it or awkward about it, he'd just done it.

He'd complimented her, everything about her. Her eyes, her smile, her laugh. He'd told her how pretty she was. And the more he said it, the more she liked it. The more she started to _believe_ him. She felt like he'd complimented her more today than she'd been complimented in her entire life.

Tyreese's voice was steady, calming in a way, and with all the nice things that he'd been saying, she'd been overtaken.

He was handsome, and he was strong, but he hadn't made her feel threatened at all. When he kissed her, she had been a little surprised, but she'd realized in the moment that she _wanted_ him to kiss her. It had been a slow, gentle kiss and for a moment Carol's mind had gone completely blank. She was thinking of nothing more than that kiss.

Now he was staying behind with her, the others having all gone home, and they were finishing up the dishes. He was talking about something, but she couldn't focus on what he was saying. She was only thinking about what was coming. They'd be done soon. She'd dump the dishwater out of the tub onto the fires to make sure they were out. She'd say goodnight to Rick and Rachel who were taking over night watch for a few nights for Josh and Brenda. Then they'd head back to their houses. Hers was on the way to his. Would he walk her home? Would he walk her to the door or just to the steps? Would there be another kiss?

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If Tyreese had hated Michonne before for torturing him with the idea of Carol, he loved her for it right now. He was already taken with her. She'd been growing more attractive to him over the past couple of days, but right now he thought she was beautiful. The kiss had been amazing, and he had to say that it left him itching for more. He was fighting with himself to keep hold of the reins. He had to take it slow with Carol, at least until she indicated that she was completely with him on this. After that kiss he didn't want to do anything that might jeopardize more.

When they finished with the dishes, Tyreese doused the fires and Carol went to say goodnight to Rick and Rachel who were wandering around near the gate. Tyreese stood on the sidewalk and waited for her to make it to him.

"Shall we go home?" Carol said.

"I guess it is getting late." Tyreese said. He slipped his arm around her, gently pulling her to him as they walked, wishing that it wasn't such a short distance to her house.

When they got to Carol's house, Tyreese walked with her up the steps and onto the porch. It was the best he could do to end, what he guessed they would call their first date. When they got to the door, Carol paused. He knew she already expected him to kiss her. That was a good sign. He leaned down and kissed her, holding it for a while, until he realized the kiss was getting a little too exciting for him, and finally broke it.

"Goodnight, Carol." He said.

"Goodnight, Tyreese." She said, smiling. She opened the door and he stood on the porch until she'd closed it.

Finally he dismounted the porch and headed back to his house, his mind swimming a little.

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"Well?" Michonne said when Carol came in. She was sitting on the couch, waiting. She'd actually been peeking through the curtains, but had rushed back to the couch when the kiss broke apart. Daryl was upstairs reading to the girls, having no interest in keeping watch with her.

Carol blushed. "Well what?" She said.

"Oh come on! Don't play that way! Tell me!" Michonne said. She patted the couch beside her.

Carol sat down. Michonne was beaming, so Carol was certain that she knew most of it. "What do you want me to tell you?"

"What's going on with you and Tyreese?" Michonne asked.

"I don't know." Carol said. "I mean we just had this incredible day today. It was out of nowhere, but it was just _perfect_."

Michonne thought Carol's face right now looked about twenty years younger, all the worry had left it. She was glowing. Michonne knew that feeling, and it thrilled her to see it on Carol's face right now.

"I'm so excited for you!" Michonne said. She hugged Carol. Carol was still smiling.

"I never expected it, you know? It just sort of happened. I don't think Tyreese has ever really talked to me much before, I mean even the other day when we played basketball together he didn't really talk much. Today it was like he was just…I don't know…like he had just made up his mind about something…about us, I guess. If there is an "us"." Carol said.

"Oh there's an "us" here." Michonne said, grinning. "Don't you worry about that, there's an "us". Was he a good kisser?"

"So you were watching." Carol said.

"I kind of knew that it might be coming." Michonne admitted. "And yes, I've been spying all day."

"How could you know it was coming?" Carol asked.

"I might have mentioned the possibility to Tyreese." Michonne said.

"And you didn't mention to me that you mentioned it to him?" Carol asked.

"I thought you might overthink it and get nervous and then that might make it harder on him." Michonne said. "So was he a good kisser?" Michonne repeated.

Carol blushed, but she smiled. "Yes, he was a good kisser." She said.

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"I just don't get why you're so excited. I mean Tyreese and Carol kissed, why are _you_ excited?" Daryl asked, watching Michonne trying to bathe at the speed of light because of the cold.

"Carol's my friend. I want her to be happy, and I think Tyreese is going to make her very happy." Michonne said.

"I mean it's good if they make each other happy, but I don't get why them kissin' makes you so darn happy." Daryl said.

"Because if there's a kiss, there will be more." Michonne said. "Don't worry about it, Daryl, I guess it's a woman thing."

Michonne came to bed and got under the mound of covers, sliding over to Daryl and kissing his chest. "The point is that I'm very happy right now, but I'm going to let you make me even happier."

Daryl pulled her face to his and kissed her.

"Well if them kissin' makes you like this, I hope they do a lotta puckerin' up." Daryl said.


	45. Chapter 45

Over the next few days, Michonne's excitement at Carol and Tyreese had been less and less. They were settling into things. It was becoming fairly obvious to the group that the two of them were attempting to build something, and it was obvious that it was still in its beginning stages. Tyreese wasn't going to pressure Carol and Carol was still figuring out exactly what was going on and how she felt about it.

They were still housecleaning at intervals and Michonne was finishing up a box that she was going to carry over to storage to be sorted. She'd already been through at least five boxes in this house.

"People had a lot of stuff." She said to no one. She was sitting on the floor, emptying the contents of a bathroom cabinet into a box.

Sometimes cleaning out the houses made you feel like a detective. You could figure out so much about people while you cleaned out their house. Pictures gave you information, but really it was what people had and how their house was that really spoke to you. This person, for instance, had an obsession with hygiene. Their bathroom cabinet was loaded with a wide variety of bottles of various soaps, face washes, and other grooming goo. Most of the bottles were half empty, suggesting that the person couldn't really stick with anything they'd found, they were always looking for something better, that was obvious since most of the bottles said "New and Improved Formula" on them.

Michonne liked this kind of work. It gave her time to think. She'd requested to do the house by herself today, not really feeling in the mood to have to make small talk with anyone. Luckily no one questioned it when she wanted to be alone. Finally they had mostly come to understand that sometimes she wanted company and sometimes she just didn't. Today she just hadn't wanted any.

The box was full, so Michonne got to her feet and heaved it up, heading down the stairs and out the door, toward the supply house. She felt like she needed to feed Hope soon. She just had to locate her. She'd left her with Daryl, but Hope and Judith both changed hands a lot throughout the day. Michonne didn't mind much because she trusted everyone that had a tendency to want to hold the babies. Maggie was good with them, Beth was good with them, Glenn was a little awkward with them, but he didn't pose any real threat, Carol was, of course, good with them, Dora kept them entertained, even Frank was good with the babies. They seemed to really like him, even though he never really said anything. He would just hold them, and he let Hope play with the dog tags that he wore around his neck, which she seemed to enjoy almost as much as she seemed to like trying to yank everyone's hair out.

"I'm going to need another box." Michonne said, coming into the sorting room in the supply house. Carol and Dora were sitting on the floor sorting. Michonne could hear the voices that were clear evidence that others were busy in the supply house putting things in their designated areas.

"There are a few empty ones in the other room. I haven't brought them in here." Carol said.

Michonne chewed her lip. "Where's Hope? I hope she's getting hungry because I'm starting to suffer a little here."

"She's napping with Frank in the other room." Dora said.

Michonne walked through. Hope was sleeping peacefully on Frank's chest, her thumb having found its way into her mouth.

"How long has she been out?" Michonne asked Frank, picking through some of the empty boxes and trying to find one she wanted to take back to the house.

"Not too long." Frank grunted.

Frank seemed fine to just sit and hold babies or watch Judith toddling around identifying objects. Michonne wondered what he thought about, but then these days there was no telling what filled anyone's minds when they just quietly sat and contemplated. She didn't want to wake Hope up. She'd be fussy if she got woken up before she was ready to be awake.

Michonne passed back into the room with Carol and Dora. Carol was getting up to move one of the filled boxes out of the way so that someone could take it to its area.

"I have something for you." Carol said, putting the box down.

"What?" Michonne asked.

Carol walked over to some of the other boxes waiting to be sorted and from it she produced what they'd been searching for in all of the houses that had apparently housed small children.

"Finally!" Michonne said. "I was starting to think we weren't going to find one."

She took the breast pump from Carol. They'd been looking for a manual one for a while, but all they'd found was electric. It was amazing to think how dependent society as a whole had become on electricity.

"You'll need to boil some water to sterilize it." Carol said. "Do you want me to get a little fire going for you?"

"Please." Michonne said. She could start a fire, but Carol had become a pro at it and it would take her less time than it would Michonne. Everyone respected Carol's fire starting abilities, among others that she possessed.

She followed Carol out while she made the fire.

"Now we can start trying Hope on cereal. I think she's old enough to start venturing into trying a little solid." Carol said, while she was getting the water on to boil. She and Michonne were staying close to the fire, trying to enjoy some of the heat it was giving off.

"Yeah, I think she's ready to start." Michonne said. "So where's Tyreese?" He'd been hanging around Carol for the past few days almost constantly.

"He went off with Daryl. Something about one of the brick columns that Daryl wanted them to work on." Carol said. "Daryl keeps a check on all of them. He doesn't want Walkers being able to push the fences down anywhere."

"I don't think anybody wants Walkers inviting themselves in." Michonne said. Carol snickered.

When the water was finally ready they sterilized the pump.

"You have no idea how excited I am about this." Michonne said. She produced a lot of milk, and it was more than enough for Hope. She'd been relieving herself, but doing it by hand was much more of a chore. She'd actually convinced Daryl to help her out, though it had been quite the battle to convince him to do it in the beginning. She hated to admit that she'd actually really enjoyed it when he finally agreed, and he hadn't had much to complain about either once he got the hang of it. This was going to make her life a lot better.

"I bet. I might use some of the extra to see if Judith will take it with cereal. She could probably use some of the extra vitamins." Carol said.

"I don't mind." Michonne said. "Hope never eats enough to empty me out. I'm going back to the house to pump, but I'll be back later."

"No problem. Take your time. Don't pump too much, though, you never know when Hope's going to wake up." Carol said.

"I won't, just enough to get the pressure off. Will you bring her if she cries?" Michonne asked.

"Of course." Carol said.

Michonne started back to the house.

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"What'cha doin'?" Daryl asked. He had come into the house just as Michonne was getting situated on the couch.

"I finally found a manual breast pump." She said.

Daryl sat down next to her on the couch. "That's one weird lookin' contraption." He said.

"Hey, it works, so I don't care how weird it looks." Michonne said. "Did you get the fence fixed?"

"Yeah, I think so. Me and Glenn and Tyreese looked at it. I just thought that one of the columns looked like it needed a little work. I don't want it collapsin' in and causin' us no problem." Daryl said.

Michonne didn't respond, and Daryl just sat back, watching her.

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When Beth had come to the door, a little out of breath, telling them that someone was at the gate and Maggie was holding them, Daryl and Michonne had both bounded out the door after her. As they were walking down the street it was obvious that the commotion hadn't spread yet. No one had come out of neither storage nor headquarters. Maggie had a young man standing in front of her, his hands up, and she had her knife out. Daryl raised his crossbow as he walked and Michonne unsheathed her katana.

Dominique was certain that he had just made the biggest mistake of his life. When this girl had drug him inside the gate, he'd immediately found a knife in front of his face.

"Don't move or I'll cut your fucking throat." She had said, and he believed her. She'd sent the other girl off to get someone named Daryl. Now what he saw was a man approaching him, with a raised crossbow and a very angry looking woman with a sword.

"Oh shit." He said.

"Don't even think of trying to do anything." Maggie said, not realizing the two were coming up behind her.

"Listen…" Dominique stammered. "I just pissed my pants and I weren't thinkin' about doin' nothin' other than that. I ain't crazy!"

"What do you want?" Daryl said. It was only then that Maggie realized he and Michonne had joined her. She didn't lower her knife though.

"Please don't kill me. I've got two girls…" Dominique stammered. "I've got two girls and if I don't come back they're not going to make it. Please don't kill me."

"What do you want?" Daryl repeated. He could already pretty much tell that this kid was probably harmless. He had very obviously pissed himself. He didn't lower his crossbow just yet though.

"I was just out, looking to see what was around." Dominique said. "I left them alone, please don't kill me." The boy stammered.

"Dominique!" Jimmy called out. The others were slowly gathering around them. "You're alive, man!"

"Jimmy? Junior? Holy shit! You made it!" Dominique said, his attention turned away from his execution team momentarily.

"Daryl, he's a good kid. He was with us before." Dora said, approaching.

Slowly Daryl lowered his crossbow, Maggie put away her knife, and Michonne sheathed her katana.

Dominique wasn't sure if it was safe to move yet, so he just stayed frozen with his hands in the air.

"Do you got anyone with you?" Jimmy asked.

"I have Chelsea and Stella." Dominique said. "As far as I know no one else made it. I didn't even know you guys made it."

"We wouldn't have, if it hadn't been for Frank's quick thinking." Jimmy said.

"How many of you _are_ there?" Daryl asked.

"When all this went down, we hunkered in our dorm for a while. When we finally left there was maybe thirty of us." Jimmy responded. "By the time we met up with the other group there weren't nowhere near that left."

"I guess we're down to five from our original group." Dominique said. "Unless of course some others made it out."

Daryl sighed. "Where's your camp?" He asked.

"It…it isn't really a camp." Dominique said. "We found this store in town and there's been some sort of massacre of Dead ones there. We've been staying in a storage room in the back of it. It stinks to high Hell, but the Dead won't come near it."

"We know the place." Michonne said.

"Was that your group who killed all those Dead?" Dominique asked. He had finally lowered his arms.

"Four of us." Daryl said.

"_Four_ of you?" Dominique said. This group was a lot better at this than his last group had been.

"Dominique, man, you pissed yourself!" Jimmy said, laughing.

"I couldn't help it." Dominique said. "I was worried about which one of them was going to kill me. By the way, you've got one Hell of a welcome wagon here."

Daryl snickered. "We don't take kindly to newcomers if we don't know they're alright." The kid looked a little less terrified now. "Go in that house over there," Daryl said pointing to headquarters, "and change your pants. Then we'll go get your girls."

Dominique nodded and started toward the house.

"So they're alright?" Daryl asked Jimmy. He nodded.

"Yeah, they're alright. I'm real sorry that they're all that's left." He said.

"I'll go with you." Rick said. "You'll need cover."

Daryl looked at him a moment and then smiled. "Fine…Rick, is it too soon to say welcome back?"

Rick shook his head. He knew what Daryl was getting at. He didn't respond, just patted Daryl's shoulder.

"I'm coming too." Michonne said. "If you run into a herd like we did, the two of you aren't going to be able to pick them off alone."

Daryl wanted to argue with her that she should stay with the group, but he knew better than to argue with Michonne when she'd made her mind up on something.

When Dominique got back, they piled in the car and headed to the store to retrieve the girls.

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It was getting dark, and it made Daryl a little nervous. He didn't like to be out this late. As they got out the car, there were five or six ambling Walkers that developed a sudden interest in them.

"I got it." Michonne said, unsheathing her katana and walking toward the group. Lopping the heads of two in her first swing and quickly turning to get the other three.

"Atta girl!" Daryl said.

Dominique decided that _that_ woman was one he didn't want to annoy.

Rick realized that he'd brought his gun, but he'd forgotten to bring his knife. He voiced it to the group.

"Don't shoot it unless you absolutely have to." Michonne said. "Daryl, you and Dominique go get the girls and I'll stay out here and keep watch with Rick."

"OK, we'll be back in a flash." Daryl said.

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The car had barely pulled out of the gates and Maggie had just rechained them when Tyreese noticed an obvious change in Carol's demeanor. He thought about it for a minute. Most of her world had just gone out those gates. She turned, like she was heading back to storage with the others, and he caught her arm.

Tyreese pulled her to him, hugging her against him.

"Hey," he said softly "they're coming back. No worries."

Carol looked up at him and he thought he saw tears brimming in her eyes. Already he felt destroyed by the look on her face. He _never_ wanted to see those tears again. The more he was getting to know her, the more he realized how _much_ she was carrying around. It was so much that she seemed to just swallow and keep down inside. He was afraid that one day it would be too much. He didn't want to see her break completely.

"It's Rick, Michonne, and Daryl." Tyreese said. "_They're coming back._" He repeated, emphasizing his words.

Carol nodded and hugged him again. He'd stand there, hugging her, until they did come back, if that was what she needed.

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Eight Walkers later, they piled into the vehicle. Michonne, putting her katana in the back, took Daryl's lap to make room for the new people piled into the car. She could feel him pressing against her leg. Apparently the closeness of sharing a seat had excited him.

"Got a little problem, 'Chonne." Daryl whispered into Michonne's ear, his breath tickling her a little.

"Think about something else." She whispered into his ear, turning a little on his lap.

He was trying to think about something else, but all he could think about was her sitting against him, on his lap, and how many times this had been an entirely different experience for him.

"Ain't workin'" He whispered.

Michonne whispered some less than desirable images into his head. It worked.

"Thanks." He whispered. "You're gross."

Michonne smiled a little.

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When they got back, the new people immediately went to Dora and Frank's house, reasoning that they would figure out sleeping arrangements the next day.

"This place is gettin' like a frat house." Daryl said when he was in bed with Michonne.

"It's fine, it's just three people." Michonne said.

"I just get worried when we bring in new people." Daryl said.

"They're good kids, though. Dora and Frank trust them and I didn't get any negative feelings from them." Michonne said.

"Yeah, but it's more people to feed. I don't want feedin' all them to run us outta here earlier." Daryl said.

"I don't think three people is going to reduce the supplies that much." Michonne said.

Daryl looked a little worried. She kissed him, hoping to make him interested in her more than in worrying.

"You was hot today." Daryl said. "I like watchin' you when you kill Walkers." Daryl admitted.

"Oh? Well I killed fourteen today." Michonne said. "Is that hot?" She kissed him, and moved her hand down to tease him.

"Mmm…" He moaned. "Yeah, that's pretty hot." He said.

"Hot enough?" Michonne asked. He was becoming aroused. "Hot enough for you to want to do whatever I want?"

"Mmm…" He moaned again. "I'd do whatever you want anyway."

"Good, because I've got some ideas about following up on that car trip." Michonne said, moving to kiss his chest.


	46. Chapter 46

AN: I probably won't be updating as much for the next couple of days. I'm going to try to at least get you some short chapters out to keep things moving, but I've got a lot of personal stuff going on that's keeping me away from the computer as much as usual. Sorry for the shortness of the next couple (maybe) of chapters, but anything is better than nothing, right?

Thank you to anyone who is still reading. Please feel free to review (good or bad) and let me know what you're thinking so far. I really enjoy hearing your thoughts and opinions. We still have quite the way to go, so I hope you're still with me!

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The newcomers were settling in well. They'd taken their own house, which Daryl had declared the "frat house" though there wasn't much of anything happening there. Dominique was clearly in a relationship with Stella, but Chelsea seemed to be left to her own devices. Michonne certainly didn't think of any of them as threats. They were good kids, still settling in, even if now they were the group's responsibility.

"I need you a minute." Carol said, finding Michonne in the street, carrying the last of the boxes from one house.

"OK, can I drop this off?" Michonne asked.

"Yes, of course." Carol said. She'd waited awkwardly at the steps outside the storage house. Michonne had gone in, putting the box down without saying anything. She went back outside to find Carol.

"What is it?" Michonne asked. Carol seemed jumpy, and that was unlike her.

"I just need your help." Carol said. Michonne followed her quietly to headquarters and waited while Carol fumbled around with things in the kitchen.

Carol came out with a bottle of rubbing alcohol and a syringe.

"I know it hasn't been three months…" Michonne started.

"Not for you." Carol said. "For me. I had a few problems before Sophia and a few with her. I'm not looking to repeat it now."

"Is there something I should know?" Michonne said, cocking an eyebrow. She had seen Carol and Tyreese together, but she hadn't realized it had become something serious. They hadn't done anything at their house.

"Not yet." Carol said. "But I don't want to ask anyone else because they'll blab. I'm just getting prepared, in case." She said. "I don't want him to find out and think I'm being presumptuous."

Michonne smiled at Carol. "I don't know what I'm doing."

Carol undid her pants and motioned. "In this area. I don't want to ask anyone else. They'll talk and it could get back."

"I don't think you're as good at drawing circles behind your back as you think you are." Michonne offered. "I've got a lot of choices."

"Imagine it's an orange cut into quarters. Upper left or upper right quarter. I don't care." Carol said. "I just don't want to end up with a baby."

Michonne followed her instruction.

"Jeez, next time try to remember that this is my ass, not a Walker's head and that's a needle, not your katana. You don't have to use so much force." Carol said, rubbing herself.

"Sorry." Michonne offered. She hadn't meant to be so rough, but she wasn't used to doing too many things delicately. "You know, you could help this along by letting him know you're interested."

"The way I was raised a woman was never interested, at least not first." Carol said.

"Do you think Daryl made a move on me?" Michonne asked. "You've got to give them something to let them know you're ready to move on or they're stuck at stage one forever. Tyreese doesn't want to scare you, so he's just going to hang out at this stage until he gets some indication that you're ready to move forward. If you want to get past the kissing and the hand holding you're going to have to nudge him a little."

"Who are you? The love doctor?" Carol said.

Michonne raised her eyebrows a little but remained otherwise expressionless. "I got Daryl, didn't I?" She said.

Carol snorted. "Good point. I just don't think I could come right out with it…"

"Well, you might want to start hinting. Maybe give him some time get ready for it…" Michonne said, smirking.

"To tell you the truth I'm a little nervous." Carol said. "It's been a pretty long time."

"Well, just be sure you remind him of that." Michonne said. "Tyreese seems like the kind of man who would take that into consideration. I have an idea."

"What?" Carol asked.

"When you've worked up your courage, ask him to come over after dinner. We'll stay up for a while and everyone can chat or play cards or something, and then I'll make Daryl go up to bed. You'll be in the perfect position to suggest a little making out that might go a little farther." Michonne said. A nervous look passed Carol's face. Michonne smiled. "Calm down, it's like riding a bicycle, you don't forget, you may just have a case of the wobblies your first few times out."

Carol laughed at Michonne having stolen her word.

"Yeah, just a case of the wobblies." She echoed.

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The dining room was pretty much full at this point. Some people ate at the table, others just sat around on the floor eating. Michonne was at the table, but Daryl had taken a spot on the floor with his back against the wall. They were done eating now, but most everyone was engaged in conversation. The new kids, were finally showing a little personality and Michonne had been engaged in a conversation with Stella, who was admiring her locks.

"I've thought about doing mine." Stella said.

"It's convenient, pretty low maintenance. I've had mine for a long time. I could help you get started, if you want." Michonne offered.

"I might take you up on that." Stella said.

Michonne liked Stella, she was very nice, maybe a little too giggly at times, but Michonne thought it was good that she was staying light despite what they'd all told them about how many people they'd lost.

It wasn't Stella who Michonne was concerned with at all. Throughout the evening she'd been watching Chelsea. The young girl was a pretty blonde with shockingly green eyes. She could have, for all intents and purposes, passed as a sister to Maggie and Beth. She was one of those girls that Michonne imagined had been a cheerleader or something in college.

She was also very obviously flirting with Daryl, though he seemed completely unaware of it. She had actually gone to sit beside him and Michonne kept watching them.

Michonne was amused at herself. She realized, suddenly, that she was a little jealous. She didn't care for the way that Chelsea was flirting with Daryl, even though it wasn't as if Daryl was flirting back. He was just talking to her because she was talking to him.

_Stop flirting with him, for Christ's sake. He's holding a baby. My baby. _Michonne thought to herself. She amused herself again. She'd never once been the jealous girlfriend. She'd always had the code that if some man she was with saw something else he wanted, he was more than welcome to go and get it, so if women flirted with them, it was up to them to decide what they wanted. These had been men who were very likely to find something better, men who were always _looking_ to _upgrade_ to newer, shinier models. Daryl wasn't even that kind of man, wasn't even aware that she was flirting with him, and yet Michonne felt jealous right now.

Watching the two of them kept distracting Michonne away from the conversation that she was trying to have with Stella. Finally, she excused herself, telling Stella she'd talk to her later.

"I'm tired." She said. Walking over to Daryl and reaching out for Hope. Daryl passed her Hope and then got to his feet.

"Me too." He said. They said goodnight to everyone and went back to the house.

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"She was outright flirting with you." Michonne said.

Daryl was laughing. Michonne was pouting with him, at least a little, and he didn't think she had any reason at all to pout. He didn't understand it, but apparently the kid, Chelsea, had been flirting with him. He just thought she was a chatty girl, so he'd talked to her whenever she'd ask him questions. They were innocent questions, he thought, and she'd asked him a lot about Hope. Now Michonne seemed a little irritated.

"'Chonne, I told ya, I weren't payin' her no attention." Daryl said. "Is you jealous of that girl?" Daryl thought it was kind of cute. He knew that Michonne had to know that even if he'd known the girl was flirting with him, it still wouldn't have mattered. He wasn't even paying attention to her.

Michonne curled her lip and picked at the pillowcase on the pillow she was holding in front of her. "Maybe…a little." She said.

"'Chonne, you ain't got nothin' to be jealous of." Daryl said.

"So you wouldn't think at all about upgrading to a newer model? I mean she's a lot younger than I am." Michonne said. Daryl smiled. Now he could tell she was teasing him a little too. He liked that she was a little jealous and pretending to be worried. To Daryl it meant that he was important to her, something she didn't want anyone trying to take away from her. He leaned over and kissed her.

"Shoot, 'Chonne, why'd I wanna go messin' 'round with kids when I got me a _woman_?" He took the pillow out of her lap and pulled her up on her knees so that he could hug her better, kissing her when she was positioned in front of him.

"A woman, huh?" She said. Kissing him. She bit his lip gently.

"Yeah. _My_ woman." Daryl said, he nipped at her neck and felt her shiver. She always liked that. There was one spot that almost always made her shiver. "You know," he said, "it might outta be me that's worried 'bout all these young roosters walkin' 'round these days. You might get a hankerin' for one of 'em."

Michonne kissed him again, and reached down to grab him gently. She looked him in the eyes, smiling slightly.

"There's only one rooster in my hen house." She said. She kissed him again, pushing him down onto the bed.


	47. Chapter 47

"Daryl…" Carol said, shuffling around and getting ready by lamplight to head out to start breakfast, "it's freezing out there, so if you're going out to check parameters you're going to want an extra layer."

"Gotcha." Daryl called from upstairs.

Carol zipped up her coat and pulled on the hood. It was probably the ugliest coat that she'd ever seen in her life. It was some sort of strange gray color that she couldn't imagine had ever been in style, but it was the coziest thing she'd ever put on in her whole life and had decided to keep it, figuring that fashion was a thing of the past. These days none of them paid any attention to fashion. If it fit, or you could make it fit with a little tweaking, and it did what you wanted it to do, you wore it, and no one was going to say anything to you.

Carol snuggled down into her coat and headed out the door to start making the breakfast that everyone would be expecting soon.

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As it was getting lighter outside, Carol was finishing up breakfast. The clouds looked like snow clouds and she was a little excited. She'd like to see the snow, and it wasn't as if it would really change their lives all that much. It might even be fun, and she had a plan for dessert if it turned out to be a good snow.

Tyreese walked up behind Carol, being one of the first outside to get breakfast. He tried to get up early, though he was never up as early as she was, to spend a little time with her while she bustled around trying to get everything ready.

"Good morning," he said, catching her off-guard. "Need any help?"

She had jumped at first, but then she just turned around and smiled, at him, standing up straight in front of him and looking up at him. He had figured out by now that this was her way of saying she expected him to kiss her. It wasn't that she was _requesting_ a kiss, she was simply _expecting _one. He obliged her.

"I think it's going to snow," she said, when they parted. Tyreese looked up at the sky. It did look like it was going to snow.

"Looks like it might," he said. Snow wasn't a common occurrence in Georgia, but it did happen from time to time and it looked like they might be in for one of those times. Tyreese chuckled a little.

"What?" Carol asked. "What is it?"

"Nothing," Tyreese said. "I was just thinking about something we used to do."

"What? Tell me," Carol urged. Tyreese noticed that she took his hand.

"I was just thinking that we better run to the store and get all the milk and bread we can before we get snowed in." Tyreese said, chuckling again. Carol laughed.

"I remember doing that!" She said. "You couldn't find milk or bread for at least a week after they said it might snow."

Tyreese looked down at Carol's hand in his. "Good Lord, woman, where are your gloves?" He grabbed Carol's other hand and wrapped both of hers in his.

"I don't wear any," Carol said. "It's easier to work without them."

"Your fingers are going to fall off," Tyreese said, rubbing her hands between his.

Carol's fingers were starting to tingle. "I keep warming them over the fire," she said. "Stop doing that, they're starting to sting."

"The stinging means that you're one step away from losing your fingers," Tyreese said, but he did release her hands. The cold bit at her hands in contrast to the warmth of his, so she shoved them quickly in her pockets to reserve a little of the warmth. "I'm sure that somewhere around here we could find some gloves that were tight enough that you could still work and that could keep your hands from freezing."

"Fine, I'll tell everyone to be on the lookout for some," Carol said, smiling.

"You better. If not, I'll tell them," Tyreese said. He kissed Carol again and then went inside headquarters where he could already see people trickling in.

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Michonne hadn't come to breakfast. It was common that she slept in if Hope and Judith would allow it, and no one made any fuss about it. She'd make up for any time she missed when she did get up, so she might as well enjoy a little extra sleep if she could.

After everyone had practically finished eating, Carol was surveying the group. She excused Josh and Brenda to go to bed. They'd been up all night, so their duty to the group was done.

Carol eyed Chelsea, who, despite the fact that he was trying to talk to Tyreese and Rick about something, was somewhat _hanging _on Daryl. Carol found this annoying. She knew that Michonne had been watching the girl and that her very open advances toward Daryl annoyed her, which Carol could understand. The girl was publicly and very openly flirting with Daryl, and though he did a great job of almost ignoring her entirely, in Carol's opinion it wasn't decent the way the girl was acting.

"Maggie, Sasha, and Beth," Carol started, "I need you three to go for water. There's a pickaxe with the buckets that you can take with you in case you run into any ice you might need to get out of the way. If you run into Walkers, though, please don't use the pickaxe to kill them. I'd like to keep that one Walker free."

The three girls got up without question.

"Jimmy and Junior, you're on watch. Go with the girls and help them get out the gate safely, please." She commanded. The boys scrambled to their feet, thanking her for breakfast before starting out the door.

"Stella and Chelsea, it's time you started to earn your keep around here." Carol said. Stella, smiling, got up from the table. The look that Chelsea shot Carol, before abandoning her efforts at, what was essentially, annoying Daryl, did not escape Carol. The look grated on Carol's nerves a little.

_Nobody questions my authority on handing out duties._ Carol thought. _Nobody, and especially not you._

Carol decided she'd give Stella the more pleasurable of the tasks she had in mind. When Stella reached her from making her way around the room which was always a little crowded, Carol returned her smile. I need you to go and get everyone's ration boxes and refill them in the storage house. There's a list of what each household gets nailed up in the main room in case you've forgotten," Carol said.

"OK, thank you for breakfast," Stella said.

"You're welcome. Let me know if you get confused," Carol responded. Stella started out the door.

Carol could see Chelsea's attitude written all over her face as she stood there with a hand on her hip, looking annoyed. Carol thought that if this were her child, she'd have taken control of her long ago. She believed in being gentle with kids, but she wouldn't tolerate disrespect.

"You're going to be mending clothes today," Carol said. "There's two boxes upstairs that need to be mended. There's plenty of thread and needles up there already."

"I don't know how to sew." Chelsea snapped back, cocking her head to the side and raising an eyebrow.

Carol smiled softly. "Then I guess it's time for you to learn." She countered. "Dora, would you mind giving her a little tutorial on how to mend things?" She asked with a little less bite to her voice.

"Sure, no problem." Dora said. She started slowly to her feet, stiffened by the cold. Carol walked over and lent her a helping hand.

"Just show her on one or two things," Carol said. "It isn't rocket science and you don't want your fingers to get too stiff."

"What about my fingers?" Chelsea asked from across the room.

"Your fingers are young, they can stand it," Carol said, a hint of smile on her face.

Dora started up the stairs with a pouting Chelsea following behind.

"Rachel, I'm going to be warming up some water to wash clothes, would you help me with laundry?" Carol asked.

Rachel, who had not missed the biting tone that Carol had assumed with Chelsea but with no one else, herself included, could quickly figure out what had gotten on Carol's nerves. "Sure thing," she said, relieved to know that they wouldn't be working with ice cold water.

"Frank, can I count on you for your magnificent babysitting skills when Michonne brings the girls over?" Carol asked.

Frank grunted and Carol knew that was his way of signaling that he didn't mind. She was amazed at how good he was with the girls. He changed diapers, fixed bottles, rocked, played with, and soothed them without ever complaining. He didn't often like to go running around in search of Michonne when Hope was hungry, but if she hadn't sensed it he'd always let someone know to go find her.

"Daryl, I don't know what your plans are for the day and who you'll need, but anyone you don't have a job for can have a job sorting things, putting them away, or cleaning out houses. If you can't figure out where you need to be, find me," Carol finished. She started collecting up the dishes to take them out back, leaving Daryl to finish doling out whatever responsibilities he may have for the others.

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"I really don't like that Chelsea," Carol commented to Michonne when she'd quietly taken her place to help Carol and Rachel with the laundry. She didn't mind doing it on days like today when Carol heated all the water. The water was so hot that it almost scalded your hands, but that heat seemed to trickle up and warm the rest of you.

Michonne shot a look at Rachel, but it appeared that Rachel already fully understood. Michonne supposed it was fine to have the conversation in front of her. Rachel was likely to report anything said back to Rick, but it didn't matter much. Daryl had begun confiding in Rick again, so he mostly knew everything that happened around there.

"If it's because of how she acts with Daryl, don't worry about it," Michonne said. "I mean I'm not really worried about it. Daryl's not like that anyway. He'll put her in her place if she goes too far."

"I have no doubt that Daryl's not that type of man, but it's still disrespectful and _shameful_ the way she openly flirts with him," Carol said.

"I have to admit," Rachel spoke up, "it _is_ a little over the top. I would be furious if she were like that with Rick."

"You don't know," Carol said, "she might be like that with Rick eventually. I don't think she had the best of upbringings before all this happened."

Michonne thought about it. Chelsea's advances had been more and more forward lately, and though Michonne didn't like it, she'd let it go so far. Daryl shrugged the girl off like most people would have gotten rid of a gnat, so she hadn't let it worry her too much.

"Do you think I should have a talk with her?" Michonne asked.

Rachel snorted.

"What?" Michonne asked.

"I was just thinking you're the last woman in the world I'd want to 'have a talk with' about flirting with her husband," Rachel responded.

Then it was Carol's turn to snort. Michonne tried to hide her smile.

"I think someone needs to have a talk with her," Carol said. "She's also got a nasty little attitude that I don't appreciate much, so I'm keeping her busy mending clothes."

Mending clothes was possibly the worst job that you could get assigned to. Carol generally reserved the job for anyone who wasn't behaving as she saw fit. Other times she did it herself so as to not make someone suffer through it. Your fingers would be killing you by the time you were done, not to mention that you'd probably stabbed your own fingertips a few dozen times. Your eyes would be tired and from the position that you often took your back and shoulders ached. It was really a miserable job, and if you got assigned the position, instead of Carol silently taking it, you knew that you had done something that was unacceptable in her eyes.

"In any case," Carol continued, "I have already dosed all the 'kids' around here with birth control. There are too many glances going on for my tastes and if they decide to start swapping each other like baseball cards we don't need the added drama of 'who's the baby's daddy' added to the equation."

"Do you think they'd do that?" Rachel asked. "I mean switch up who they're with just like that?"

"They might," Michonne said. "Most of them just got together because there wasn't anybody else. Now they've got a lot more choices, and there's a wild card in the bunch."

Carol stopped for a minute. She got up and collected up the clean clothes to go and hang up.

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Daryl was wandering in the far side of the community, freezing, but not as bad as he would have been if he hadn't taken Carol's advice and thrown his heavy leather jacket on top of the layers he was already wearing.

It had started snowing. They were huge flakes, and Daryl had actually stopped a few times to catch a few of them on his tongue, sure that no one would see his brief trip back to childhood. They were accumulating, too, so that meant that tomorrow they'd all likely take a day off to enjoy the snow.

He'd talked to Rick, Tyreese, and Glenn. They were working on actually putting into action the idea of planting things and being able to do so when the ground thawed out. Daryl was surveying the sizes of the yards available to them, having designated an area that they would dedicate to such a task. He was trying to figure out how much space, exactly, was going to be available and how much they might realistically produce in that given space. They'd also discussed the rather daunting task that they thought they might begin of tearing down the houses in that area and tearing up the streets to give them more space for growing things. It would be a huge undertaking by hand, but Daryl thought that he'd tear down the houses piece by piece with an axe and break up the pavement with a sledgehammer himself if it meant that his family could stay there, safe, for a long time.

He had not expected Chelsea to come bounding out of nowhere.

_Damn kid's like a fox or something._ Daryl thought. He hadn't heard her coming and had no indication that she was coming, it was like she just popped up.

"What are you doing out here?" She asked.

"Workin'," Daryl said, shortly. "Ain't that what you're s'posed to be doin'? Carol won't like it none if you fall down on the job."

"Carol's not the boss of me, and besides, I'm on a break." Chelsea responded, falling in step with Daryl.

She was distracting and Daryl wished she'd go away. He wasn't in the mood to talk. He was busy and for him figuring out how much food they could produce themselves annually was a very important piece of business.

"Carol's the boss of everybody," Daryl said. "Even you."

The only people that Carol didn't boss around were Daryl and Michonne and that was because she knew that both of them would come to her to find out what to do if they weren't busy doing something already.

"I don't know why everyone lets her boss them around," Chelsea said. "It's not like she runs this place. That's your job, isn't it?"

"Nobody runs this place," Daryl said. "We work together to get done what needs doin' so that everybody gets to enjoy it. You gotta earn your keep 'round here if'n you expect to be taken care of." Daryl said sharply.

"You're cute when you're grumpy." Chelsea said.

"I ain't grumpy, I'm busy and you're distractin' me. Now get on back to headquarters and do what you're s'posed to be doin'." Daryl said, obviously annoyed.

"Don't be that way." Chelsea said. "I just came down here to see if you might want a little company. You shouldn't have to be walking around out here all alone."

"I don't want no company. If I wanted company, I reckon I'da asked someone to come with me, but I wouldn'ta asked _you_," Daryl responded. Why was she still following him? She was like a fungus, he couldn't get rid of her.

"Oh, come on now. It might do you some good to talk to me," Chelsea said. "Stop being so serious all the time and think about other things. There _are_ things to think about besides work, you know…especially when it's so cold."

Daryl stopped short when he felt Chelsea take his hand. He snatched his hand away from her.

"Listen, I don't know if you missed somethin' or not, but I got me a woman and I do plenty of thinkin' 'bout other things 'sides work, but _she's_ involved in what I think about _and_ what I do. That baby of hers is mine too, you know." Daryl snapped. Chelsea backed up a little, but the smile returned to her face after a few minutes.

"Well accidents happen. I don't hold that against you." Chelsea said.

"Hope weren't no damn accident!" Daryl snapped again. "And 'Chonne's my fuckin' wife! I don't need some nitwit kid followin' me 'round and gettin' her upset, and I'd advise you to listen to what I'm tellin' you 'cause I don't think you really wanna piss 'Chonne off!"

Chelsea backed away again, a look of fear in her eyes at Daryl's reaction. He didn't care, and he didn't lower his voice.

"I done told you once and I ain't gonna tell you again, get your ass back to headquarters and do what the hell you're s'posed to be doin'!" He yelled. Chelsea turned without saying anything and headed in the other direction. "Damn, why the fuck they gotta bring this shit here for anyway?" Daryl said, not to anyone but himself.

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Tyreese and Glenn were busy moving furniture that they weren't going to use and busting it up behind headquarters for Carol to use as firewood.

When Tyreese saw Carol coming, he knew she had something on her mind. She had her hands on her hips and her walk was not the leisurely stroll of trying to see what everyone was up to. This was a walk of determination.

"Glenn, can I speak to Tyreese a minute?" Carol asked when she got there. Glenn, who was struggling at the moment to get the leg off of an office desk, paused and looked up.

"Sure," he said, looking a little unsure of what he should do.

"Alone?" Carol prodded. Glenn took her cue and trotted off to scope out more furniture.

"Well, what's on your mind?" Tyreese asked, trying not to smile at the face she was making. He couldn't tell if she was mad, annoyed, or just thinking too hard, but the face was cute. "Because I can tell you're thinkin' something," he added.

"Now that Chelsea's here and unattached, you've got more options," Carol said, lowering one hand from her hip but keeping the other firmly in place.

Tyreese just looked at her for a moment. She was obviously steamed, and it involved him, but he wasn't sure what he had done or had failed to do to bring about such a mood.

"I'm sorry, Carol, but I'm not sure what you're getting at and because of the look on your face I'd like a little more information before even trying to respond to you." He said. He put down the axe that he was holding and walked over to face her.

"I mean if you've been talking to me just because I was the only available option you had, then you've got more options now." Carol said. Her face changed a little, but it obvious that she was still thinking. Tyreese didn't say anything, waiting to see if she had more to add to it. "Chelsea's not tied to anyone, and she's a pretty, young girl," Carol added. She was still thinking and Tyreese waited her out. "_Is_ that the only reason that you've been talking to me?" She asked finally. Now she looked hurt, and Tyreese felt sorry for it, even though he had not been responsible for any of it.

"Carol," he said softly after a minute, "if that were the case, and I was looking for was a piece of ass from the first person that would give it to me, do you think I would have kept talking to you after she got here? I'd have gone after her that first night. She doesn't seem like one that would have any qualms about just giving it away." Now it was Tyreese's turn to look hurt. "You know," he said, "I really thought that you would have thought better of me than that," he said. He paused a moment, both of them looking at each other, Tyreese looking disappointed and Carol looking apologetic already. "I really thought by now you wouldn't think I was that kind of man. I've certainly _tried _to give you every indication that I wasn't."

Carol stopped. "I'm sorry, Tyreese," she said. "I didn't mean it to come off that way. I guess I just got riled up. It was something Michonne said about the teenagers here…" Carol started.

"Michonne?" Tyreese asked. "She's the one that made me think about it in the first place. Why would she think that I was going to be like that?"

"No," Carol corrected, "she wasn't talking about you. She was talking about the kids switching off partners now that they had more options and I guess it just made me wonder…" She was cut off by Tyreese, who grabbed her, a little more roughly than he'd intended, and pulled her to him in a kiss.

"You don't have to wonder," he said after they parted. "I wasn't exploring other options."

Carol didn't know what to say, didn't know if she could say anything just then. She just sort of nodded at him and turned around, leaving him to get back to work.

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What are you doing?" Maggie asked, passing through the kitchen and finding Carol eating something out of a can.

Carol wiped her mouth and showed Maggie the can of sweetened condensed milk.

"Oooh, can I have some?" Maggie asked, her eyes growing wide at the prospect of all that sweetness.

"No," Carol said. Maggie looked disappointed. "I'm testing it to see if it's still good. If I'm not violently ill in about thirty minutes then you'll all get some, don't make that face."

Maggie made another face at her and continued on the path that she had started.

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After dinner, Carol collected the dirty dishes to take them outside. She informed everyone that she had a special treat for them, but that they'd have to be patient and give her a minute to get dessert ready. Everyone was fine with that, and went back to the conversations that they'd been enjoying.

In the kitchen, Carol went to work trying to quickly prepare the dessert that she'd planned. She'd had the others help her lay out sheets around on the ground, forbidding anyone to walk on them but not explaining their purpose. Now she had a few buckets of snow collected and numerous cans of sweetened condensed milk she'd opened, having discovered that though it wasn't quite as delicious as she'd remembered it being before, it was still good and not left her heaving. She was trying to mix it together in batches in a large bowl and dole it out to smaller ones, not really afraid of it melting since the kitchen wasn't much warmer than it was outside, and nothing much had melted out there since the snow started accumulating. She was getting it done, but she'd created a pretty sticky mess for herself.

Tyreese slipped into the kitchen to see if Carol needed help with anything.

"What are you doing?" He asked.

"Making snow cream," she said, smiling. "I'm making a pretty big mess of things, though. I'm going to need a bath. I'm covered in condensed milk."

She held up her hands demonstrating their sticky coating. To her surprise, Tyreese, who was standing behind her, took her wrist and pulled it to him, sucking one of her fingers.

Carol was surprised at herself, feeling her breathing speed up, and feeling an electrical jolt from the action.

"Sweet," Tyreese said, kissing the back of her neck. Her head was spinning and she closed her eyes for a minute.

"Yeah…" she stammered, "it's very sweet."

"I wasn't talking about the milk," Tyreese said. He turned her around and kissed her, pressing her against the counter.

Carol's heart was pounding. She didn't put her hands on him, but she surprised herself by grinding against him, almost unconsciously. She hadn't felt like this before, like she so desperately didn't want this kiss to end, like she wanted _more_ of him than just his tongue.

"Oh!"

They both jumped, pulling apart at the sound. Carol blushed, realizing they were both panting and Maggie was standing there looking wide eyed, her hand over her mouth.

"I'm sorry," Maggie stammered, still standing there.

Tyreese moved away from Carol. He cleared his throat.

"I'm going to head home, call it an early night," he said.

"Don't you want dessert?" Carol asked.

Maggie still hadn't moved. She was frozen there with her hand over her mouth like she didn't know what to do.

"No thanks, I've had plenty," he said. Tyreese quickly went out the kitchen and then they heard the front door close.

Carol looked at Maggie, blushing again, but didn't say anything. She didn't know what was coming over her, but she almost felt like crying. Instead she just grabbed her spoon and again and went back to scraping cans into the bowl, trying not to look at Maggie.

"Carol, I'm so sorry," Maggie started. Carol just shook her head for a second.

"Don't worry about it," she said.

"It was just taking a while so I thought you might need some help," Maggie continued.

"You could start carrying bowls and spoons into everyone," Carol said, still without looking at her.

Carol hoped that Maggie wouldn't say anything, and she hoped that such a situation would arise again with Tyreese. She wanted that feeling back again, but she wasn't sure how she was going to get it.

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Michonne smiled at Hope. Daryl was "sharing" his ice cream with her and she kept her mouth open, her tongue out, following his spoon around like some kind of baby bird. She noticed, though she didn't know why, that Chelsea hadn't so much as spoken to Daryl tonight, though she did keep looking over there. Daryl had chosen to sit next to Michonne tonight and now to tease Hope with ice cream.

"She likes it," Michonne said to Daryl.

"'Course she does," Daryl said, "'Cause it tastes a lot like what she's used to, 'cept it's cold." He whispered to her.

"What do you mean?" Michonne whispered back.

Daryl blushed. "Well, your milk kinda tastes a little like this, 'cept it's got somethin' nutty to it and somethin' that's kinda like cinnamon or somethin'," Daryl whispered. He blushed again because Michonne was smiling at him.

"So now you're a connoisseur of breast milk?" Michonne whispered in his ear.

"Just yours," Daryl said, blushing again.

Michonne smiled at him again and went back to studying the room. Everyone was pleased with the ice cream, even though they had to suffer the cold weather to get it. Michonne had to admit that it had been an unexpected treat, though she'd known Carol was up to something.

Carol looked out of sorts tonight, and Michonne didn't know why. Tyreese had left early, so she suspected that it had something to do with that, but she hoped that he hadn't left because of any kind of conflict and that Carol was just sad because he wasn't there. Regardless, Carol wasn't talking to anyone, so it was pretty clear that she didn't have much desire to discuss her feelings right now, and Michonne wouldn't push her until she decided to open up to her.

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"Well, I'm glad you put her in her place, but I'm still going to have a little talk with her," Michonne said to Daryl when they were in bed and he had recounted his encounter that day with Chelsea.

"I didn't like that she called Hope an accident. She ain't got no right to talk about things she don't know nothin' 'bout," Daryl pouted.

"Daryl," Michonne said, "Hope _was_ an accident."

"No she weren't and don't you say that no more," Daryl said.

"Well I certainly didn't plan to get pregnant," Michonne said. "Did you have some master plan that you didn't tell me about?"

"No, weren't no plan," Daryl said.

"Then that's an accident," Michonne said.

"No it weren't neither," argued Daryl. "An accident is when somethin' happens and you don't like the result of it. A surprise is when somethin' happens and you do like it. That means Hope weren't no accident. She was a surprise."

Michonne smiled. "You know what, Daryl, I'm going to give that one to you. I like the sound of that. She wasn't an accident. She was just a surprise."

Daryl kissed her. "I think the girl done been set straight," he said, "what you gon' say to her?"

"I don't know yet, Daryl, but she's going to hear from me on the situation," Michonne said.

"Just remember, 'Chonne, she's really just a kid still. Don't scare her too much," Daryl said.

"Don't worry, Daryl, I won't scare her any more than she needs to be scared," Michonne said.

"I mean it weren't like I'da done nothin' no way," Daryl said.

"I know that, Daryl. Believe me, I know that. She still needs to know that it's not OK to go after other women's husbands before she starts trying it out with others around here. I figure I'm as good a woman as any to let her in on that secret," Michonne said.

"You is that, 'Chonne. You is that," Daryl responded.


	48. Chapter 48

AN: Thanks to everyone who is still reading and still with me! I appreciate knowing that you like the story enough to keep coming back, and I hope you enjoy where we go in the future.

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Michonne pulled her cloak tighter around her as she walked toward headquarters where she could already see that Carol was working to get a fire going. She'd cleared an area of snow, and was just beginning to get some sparks going.

"Good morning," Michonne said, approaching.

"Morning," Carol mumbled, not looking up from the baby fire that she'd finally kindled. Michonne sat down next to her.

"Is the snow making it harder to get it going?" Michonne asked. Carol didn't respond. "Daryl is taking the girls down to Dory and Frank's house. We're going to take them some breakfast. He figured they might not want to come out much today since it's so cold," Michonne added.

"That's fine," Carol said.

"Do you want to talk about it?" Michonne offered.

"There's nothing to talk about," Carol said.

It was pretty obvious to Michonne that there _was_ something to talk about and it was pretty obvious that Carol did want to talk about it.

"Is it something with you and Tyreese?" Michonne asked. "I thought things were going well."

"Things are fine with Tyreese," Carol said, unconvincingly.

"I see," Michonne said. "Did something happen last night? Is that why he left dinner early?"

Carol sighed. She put more wood on the now growing fire and brought over the wire grate that Daryl had made into a makeshift stove for her.

"Maggie walked in the kitchen last night and caught us," Carol said.

Michonne looked shocked for a minute, and then she smiled.

"In the kitchen, Carol? With everyone right in the other room?" Michonne asked, a sound of surprise in her voice.

"No, we weren't doing _that_," Carol said. "We were kissing…and I thought it might be a little more."

"Did you want it to be a little more?" Michonne asked. Carol was blushing a little. Michonne knew by now that Carol didn't mind talking about sex, as long as it wasn't herself that she was talking about. She would rib Michonne, and a few others, from time to time about their escapades, but she quickly got embarrassed when Michonne questioned her about the advancing relationship she had with Tyreese.

"I don't know," Carol said quietly, moving one of the large pots onto her stove to start boiling water for oatmeal.

"Well, Carol, either you did or you didn't. I've never made out with a guy and not known afterwards if I wanted something more or not," Michonne said. When Carol didn't respond, she continued. "You know, Carol, we're both grown women. It's OK to admit that you have feelings, even sexual ones. I know you said you weren't raised that way, but this life functions on an entirely different set of rules than the one we knew before."

"OK, so maybe I did want more. It wasn't even really making out. It was…well, I don't know what it was. It was a kiss, and a little more." Carol said.

"So why don't you just let him know you liked it? Let him know you want that? You can't play around it forever. Sooner or later you're either going to have to move forward or abandon the whole thing. Which would you rather do?" Michonne said.

Carol's face changed. She didn't look as embarrassed as she had before. There was a little bit of the fire in her eye that she got whenever she was about to challenge Michonne. Michonne always thought it was funny to see that look appear because it was one that Carol hadn't ever shown her in the beginning. At one time Carol had always been meek around her, like she wouldn't have dared to talk back to her at all, now Carol didn't seem to regard her as such an untouchable person. She realized that Carol had fully accepted her as a friend, and as a friend, she was just as likely to get a snarky comment from Carol as anyone else.

"That's great, Michonne," Carol said, "I hadn't thought about that. So what should I do, exactly? Should I go find Tyreese after breakfast and say 'Hey, you remember what we were doing last night? Well, I've got a few minutes, so how about we go find somewhere where Maggie won't be popping up and pick up where we left off?'"

Michonne laughed a little at Carol's tone. There was some bite to, but it was pretty obvious that it wasn't directed at her. Michonne imagined that the bite in her voice was really coming more from her frustration, and right now she was wearing her frustration very obviously. Michonne didn't even have to try to read her to see that Carol was struggling with some of the same feelings that she'd had when she'd begun to entertain the idea of Daryl, not knowing if he would even be interested in someone like her. She remembered that frustration, and the yearning, and how it could quickly make you angry with your own thoughts and with anyone around you.

"Well if that's what you'd like to do, I really don't see anything wrong with it," Michonne offered. Carol glared at her.

That wasn't exactly what Carol wanted to do. What Carol wanted to do was something that she knew was entirely unlike her. She wanted to rip all her clothes off and throw herself at him. She wanted to feel his hands, his mouth, everything. She wanted to be_ ravished_. That's what all the smutty novels that she and Dora passed back and forth called. She wanted to show him those books, where they'd dog eared the pages of all the good parts, and she wanted to tell him that now, at night, when she read just the dog eared pages, not needing the rest of the plot, that she was thinking of him and wishing that he was doing the same thing to her that all the heroes of the novels were doing to the heroines. She wanted to act out every one of those scenes, but she knew that wasn't her, and she wasn't the women in those books. Those women knew what they were doing, and a part of her was worried that when the time finally did come, she'd disappoint Tyreese. She'd only ever been with Ed, and the more of those novels she read, the more she realized how clumsy Ed was. She imagined even the lusty teenagers walking around this place had more experience than her, and that might not be at all what Tyreese was looking for.

"Carol?" Michonne got her attention again. Michonne had noticed that Carol was deeply lost in thought, so much so that she had forgotten to add the oatmeal to the water that was clearly boiling now. "Do you want me to help you out?"

Carol looked at Michonne. "How could you help me?" She asked.

Michonne sighed. "I'm going to set this up for you," Michonne said, "but it's up to you to make it happen. I'm going to get you the opportunity you need, but you better not blow it. You've got until this evening to do whatever it is you need to do to get ready. Understand?"

Michonne heaved to her feet. "Water's boiling."

Carol poured the oatmeal in the water and stirred it. "This evening?" She sounded a little nervous.

"This evening," Michonne said. "It's time to pull the band aid off and get on with life." She walked toward headquarters to figure out exactly what she was going to do to help Carol get over this frustration she was carrying around.

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At breakfast Tyreese couldn't help but notice how jumpy Carol was around him and he wasn't quite sure what to do with it. He didn't know if the night before had freaked her out or what. He knew she had liked it. She had been very clearly responding to him. The way she had ground into him had make him thankful that he hadn't waited to get warm bath water. He'd spent most of the night pleased with the thought that Carol was not only warmed up to him, but she was actually hot for him, and he wouldn't have to keep playing it safe for too much longer before she was probably ready to head to the next level. And now, here she was, just as jumpy around him as she'd been the first day when he helped her carry boxes.

Tyreese caught up with Carol after everyone had cleared out from breakfast. They were all taking a snow day and everyone had their own activities planned. It appeared, however, that Carol wasn't taking any time off. She was doing the dishes now.

"What are you going to do when you finish that?" Tyreese asked. Carol jumped. "Sorry, I shouldn't have snuck up behind you," he said.

"No, it's fine," she stammered. "I'm, uh…I'm not sure what I'm going to do. Daryl said something about everyone working on a snowman? I might join in on that for a little while."

Tyreese didn't like the vibes he was getting from Carol right this minute. Just last night she was pushing against him and searching his mouth with her tongue and now she looked like she might freak out if he even put his hand on her shoulder. He decided to leave her alone for a little while to let her work out whatever it was she was going through, hoping that then she'd be back to normal.

"Yeah, he and Rick were talking about helping Carl build one," Tyreese said. I'm going to check in on Sasha and see if she had anything in mind or if she wanted to help with it. Maybe I'll see you down there?"

"Maybe," Carol said.

Carol's heart was pounding. She didn't know what to think and knew she wasn't thinking clearly. What would happen this evening? She hoped she could rake together her courage and at least be more confident and more collected than she was right now. She wasn't going to be able to pull off being the heroine of one of the novels, that was clear to her now, but she also didn't want to be the big mess of nerves that she felt like she was right now. She just needed to calm down and let things go where they were going. She took a few deep breaths and continued to finish up the breakfast dishes.

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Michonne knocked on Glenn and Maggie's door and waited for Maggie to open it. She was clearly in the process of layering her clothes to go out and play in the snow. Nearly everyone was outside, playing in the snow. The whole community rang with laughter and chatter.

"Hey Michonne," Maggie said. "What's up?"

"Can we borrow one of your Uno decks for the evening?" Michonne asked.

"Sure. Come in, I'll get you one. You can keep it if you want, we've got like four," Maggie said, walking away from the door and letting Michonne in.

Glenn was in the living room putting on boots, but Beth was nowhere to be seen. She was probably with Junior. Michonne looked around the living room that was scattered with so much stuff.

"This place is a mess," she said to Maggie. "You really out to clean up."

Maggie shrugged. "Why bother? We'll just drag it all back out if we put it up," she said.

"Do any adults live here?" Michonne asked, surveying the quantity of toys and games they had acquired.

"We try to pretend that none do," Glenn offered.

"This coming from someone who stopped by for Uno cards," Maggie said, offering Michonne a box of cards. Michonne took them.

"You got me there, but this is a lot," she said. She shrugged. They all did what they liked to do and they might as well enjoy themselves, she thought.

"Uno cards?" Glenn asked. "You're playing Uno?"

"They are this evening," Maggie said.

"Hey, that's cool. We can come over and play with you. I'm itching for a re-challenge since you cleaned up last time," Glenn said, smiling.

"Next time, Glenn," Michonne said. "This game is a little different."

"What are you doing? Playing strip Uno?" Maggie asked with a snicker. Glenn looked disappointed.

"Something like that," Michonne said. "Thanks for the cards," she said, turning to leave.

"No problem," Maggie called behind her as she let her out the door.

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"This is going to be the world's biggest snowman!" Carl said to Daryl as he helped him pack the base. Rick had decided to be proactive about the snowman and had taken the younger members of the group to the other side of the community with wheelbarrows to bring together as much snow as possible for their snowman.

"Kid, it might be the only snowman," Daryl said. He still wondered from time to time how many people were out there, and how they were living. Were most of them still on the run, living day to day in terror, or had others built communities like theirs where they got to enjoy the passing of days and nights without much worry? The life they had here was good, and Daryl appreciated every moment of it. One of their first nights here he had heard Dominique lamenting that these were supposed to be the best days of their lives, as college kids, and that this had happened. Daryl hated to admit it, but frankly these _were_ the best days of his life. The world had to go to shit for him to be the happiest that he could imagine being. Now here he was, building a snowman with his new and improved family, his wife was wandering around somewhere doing whatever it was that she did when he wasn't around, and his daughter was being entertained by a crotchety old man who spoke five words a day at best to adults but had a soft spot for pretty little girls who wanted him to read them _Goodnight Moon_ a thousand times. Daryl chuckled to himself.

"What is it?" Carl asked.

"Nothin' kid, just thinkin'," Daryl responded.

Michonne walked past, not really looking at anything. Daryl could tell she was lost in thought.

"Hey you!" He called. She turned, seeing him for the first time. "Why don't you come help us build this here snowman," Daryl said. "Carl said it's gonna be the biggest in the world. We can't do that alone."

"Maybe later," Michonne said. "I'm busy right now. Do you know where I could find everyone? They've all disappeared."

"Most everyone went with Rick to the other side. They're gonna bring back all the snow they can get to make this guy a monster," Daryl offered. Michonne just nodded her head and started off again, steering her steps toward the other side of their community.

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Michonne found Tyreese first, on one of the streets with Sasha, Jimmy, Dominique, and Stella. They were all raking snow up with shovels and packing it into a large wheelbarrow that they'd found.

"Tyreese, can I talk to you a minute?" Michonne called, approaching. Tyreese put his shovel down and walked over, meeting her halfway.

"Sure, what's up?" He asked.

"I wanted to ask you to come over to our house tonight, after dinner. We're just going to hang out and play Uno. We thought you might want to come and play," Michonne said. _Or, you know, you could just come and hang out with Carol, because we're blowing you both off after one game._ She thought.

Tyreese hadn't actually been inside their house before. He'd often walked Carol to the door at night if he stayed after dinner, but she'd never invited him in.

"Sure, that sounds like fun," Tyreese said.

"It's a private party," Michonne said. She didn't know how else to let him know that he shouldn't find out if anyone else was interested in joining them. She didn't want the task of getting rid of everyone without making it obvious that she wanted Tyreese to stay. If it was just the four of them she was fairly certain she could get Daryl upstairs without much trouble and without making it obvious what she was doing.

Tyreese looked confused for a moment. "Fine, I understand," he said.

"Good," Michonne said. She turned and walked away without offering anything else.

Michonne was up to something, of that Tyreese was sure. He wasn't going to argue, though. Getting to be around Carol that evening was something he was looking forward to now. He just hoped she was over whatever it was that was bothering her this morning or things might be a little tense. He didn't know how much Michonne knew, but he was pretty certain that Carol shared most everything with her.

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Michonne located Rick's group of snow collectors on their way back toward the giant snowman, Rick pushing the wheelbarrow that was overflowing and the others walking behind him, dragging their shovels.

"Rick, do you mind if I borrow one of your workers a minute?" Michonne asked as she approached the group.

"No problem," Rick said.

Michonne approached Chelsea. "I'd like to talk to you for a minute," she said.

Chelsea eyed Michonne suspiciously, and everyone else had started to scurry off. The idea of talking to Michonne, especially when she looked as expressionless as she was right now, wasn't something that was appetizing to many of them.

"What do you want?" Chelsea asked, noticing that her friends were all abandoning her.

"Just to have a talk. Let's walk, it's too cold to just stand still," Michonne said, motioning away from the direction that the group was travelling in.

Chelsea followed her, somewhat timidly, not saying a thing.

"Look, I know about your advances on my husband," Michonne said finally. "I don't know anything about you, and I don't know how you were raised, but I'm going to let you know that it's not OK to make advances on anyone's partner around here. We don't have much left in this world, and what we do have left, most of us are fiercely protective of."

Chelsea didn't respond at first. Michonne walked on a minute with her. "I'm going to let you off the hook, just this once, but I'm warning you that if you try it again, it's going to be you and me," Michonne challenged.

Chelsea didn't know how to respond. Everyone here had somebody, except her. It was annoying to sit around and watch them all, paired off most of the time, and she was just twiddling her thumbs. She'd had a boyfriend when all if this started, Andrew, and he'd been amazing. The only reason she'd gone to school here was because of him. They'd been high school sweethearts and he'd gotten a football scholarship. They were going to get married, but her parents had forbidden it until after college. She needed an education, they said. Now she didn't have an education, she was pretty sure she didn't have parents, and she didn't have Andrew. He'd been one of the first to be overtaken when they'd left the dorms. He'd been trying to protect them, he'd slowed down the Dead ones that were after them. She'd never even gotten to say goodbye.

She'd thought about moving on, hoping to find someone. She missed Andrew, but she was lonely. Every day that they made it, every encounter they had, every loss they suffered, they'd all made her feel more and more alone. The last fight had forced them away from their old group. Eight of them had been wandering around together and one by one they'd been picked off.

In her group, people had changed who they were with like dance partners, mostly owing to someone losing their partner in an attack and later connecting with someone else who had suffered the same loss. They'd all treated Chelsea like she was untouchable, though, and it was probably owing to the amount of time she'd spent mourning Andrew's death.

Now they were with this new group and she was completely alone. She didn't know where she fit with this group at all. Dominique and Stella were fine. They had each other, and slowly they were becoming accepted, and even included, by the others. She felt like she was floating around on the outside, with no way to get in.

She didn't know why exactly she'd chosen Daryl as an object of interest. It was probably because he seemed like the most open of the men. He was handsome, and he had a kind face. He was also not as often "up under" Michonne as some of the others were with their partners. She had thought that maybe there was a little wiggle room there. Maybe he wasn't as attached to her as the others were? Maybe they'd just gotten into a spot of trouble with the baby and had stayed together because of that? Now Chelsea realized she'd read the entire thing wrong. If they did spend time apart, it was obviously just because they didn't seem to need the constant affirmation that some of the others needed. She realized she had overstepped a boundary.

"I'm sorry," Chelsea said finally. "I didn't really mean anything by it…" she continued, "I guess I was just looking for something. I don't have anybody, you know?"

Michonne was a little struck. Looking at her now, Chelsea didn't look like the overconfident cheerleader that she usually looked like. She looked sad, and she really did look sorry. Michonne also realized, in this moment, how young the girl actually was. She was just a kid with a little of the softness rubbed off.

"It's OK," Michonne said, "but don't let it happen again." Chelsea nodded, but didn't say anything. "You may find someone out there, you don't know what we'll find, but it's not going to be anyone's partner. Even though a lot of rules don't exist anymore, that's one rule that's remained in place. You don't mess with another woman's man."

Chelsea nodded again. "I got it," she said.

Michonne felt sorry for the girl for a minute. _What the hell is wrong with me? I'm supposed to be out here setting her straight for trying to get something going on with Daryl, and now I'm feeling sorry for her because she's wearing that damn sad face? _Michonne thought.

Michonne decided not to respond to Chelsea. She simply walked off, considering the case closed for now. If the girl was smart, and stayed away from Daryl, she'd forgive her for slipping up in the first place. If she slipped again, though, Michonne would knock that sad face right off of her. She had her warning, and if she was smart, she'd take heed.

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Carol barely made it through dinner. Michonne had already told her the plan she'd come up with. They'd go back to their house with Tyreese in tow. Carol was already planning to boil water and make hot chocolate for the four of them. They'd play a game of Uno so that the invitation that Michonne had made didn't look bogus, and then Michonne would convince Daryl to go with her to get the girls down and go to bed, leaving Carol and Tyreese to do whatever they wanted with their alone time.

Carol was playing the scenario over in her head a dozen times. The bad thing was that she could see things going super smoothly in about half of the scenarios and then she could see things going really wrong in the other half.

After dinner, she finished the dishes up with the help of Michonne while Daryl and Tyreese headed back to the house. She'd put water on to boil while they were finishing the dishes, and when it was done she used the dish water to douse the flames. They carried the boiling water back to their house and in the kitchen Michonne helped her make hot chocolate from some packets that she'd found and brought over for a treat. Snowy days just needed hot chocolate and tonight was a special occasion.

Daryl had engaged Tyreese in a conversation about their upcoming plans to start trying to open up more space in the back part of the community. They were going to try to tear down one of the houses, just to see how possible it was and how long it took. Glenn had suggested burning the houses down, but there was a lot that could be done with the wood and bricks if they took them apart. Still, they hadn't decided if it was actually a doable project or just something that seemed doable until they began.

Michonne and Carol interrupted the conversation by coming in and handing each of them a mug of hot chocolate. Michonne sat down beside Daryl on the couch, dragging Hope's bouncy seat closer to her. Judith was running around, hopefully tiring herself out for the night.

"Ok, does everyone know the rules?" Michonne asked, handing out cards.

Every affirmed that they did and the game began.

Tyreese sat on the floor beside Carol, who seemed a little calmer than she had that morning. Apparently, whatever the issue had been, she'd worked through it a little.

As the game went on, Carol was alternating between growing nervous, and then relaxing again. From time to time she felt Tyreese put his hand on her thigh. Oddly enough the contact made her calmer, thus giving her a little hope that the nerves would almost entirely leave her once the game was over and she figured out how to proceed with the evening. She hoped that he would figure out what was going on and help her a little.

When the first game was done, Michonne stretched and willed herself to yawn by mentally repeating the word over and over in her head. It had worked.

"I'm pretty tired," she said. "Daryl, let's put the girls down and go to bed."

"It's still early…" Daryl said.

Michonne made a face at him. It was her bored face. She usually made it whenever he wasn't doing what she wanted.

"Daryl, let's go to bed," she repeated.

Daryl couldn't understand it. It was early. Judith wasn't even entirely ready to go to bed yet. He thought about it for a second and then decided that maybe she was horny and this was her way of letting him know. If that was the case, he was willing to turn in early.

"Fine, we're going to bed," he said, getting up and picking up Judith. Michonne got Hope out of her bouncy chair.

"Goodnight, you two," Michonne said. Daryl grunted his goodnight and followed Michonne upstairs.

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When they got into the bedroom, it was obvious that Daryl had misinterpreted her desire to go to bed as a desire for extracurricular activities. Michonne, however, knew that the walls were not as sound proof as Daryl thought they were. He still didn't realize that the walls of the house afforded them little more privacy than those of the prison. She didn't want any of their sounds to drift downstairs and disturb whatever was going on there.

"Not tonight, Daryl." Michonne said, getting in bed.

"What'cha mean not tonight? What'd you drag me up here for then if'n it weren't to have a little fun?" Daryl asked. He got in bed too, obviously beginning to pout. Michonne couldn't very well explain to him that she had basically tried to set up the perfect scene to get Carol laid, since Daryl wouldn't understand why she would orchestrate such a thing.

"It's time for bed, Daryl. I just though Carol and Tyreese might like a little alone time together, you know?" She said.

"I ain't even sleepy, 'Chonne," Daryl said. "I could be sleepy, though, if you'd roll over here an' be nice to me."

Michonne stifled a laugh. She rolled over to face Daryl.

"I'm not being mean to you. I'm just saying not tonight," she said. "I'm allowed to say that sometimes, you know," she added.

Daryl moved his hands between her legs and she had to fight to make herself reach down and push it away. She wanted him to understand that she actually was just as interested as he was, but she didn't want the sounds to make whatever interaction was taking place awkward. It would be hard to advance a beginning romance with the background noises that they could provide.

"Nope," she said, "not tonight."

Daryl pouted. He didn't understand Michonne sometimes. Now he was in bed early and was all fired up because he'd been sure that's what they were coming up here for and now he just had to go to sleep? It didn't make any sense at all. Let them do whatever they wanted to do in the other room, but he wanted to do what he wanted to do in his.

Michonne smiled at Daryl's clearly frustrated face.

"It's time for bed, Daryl," she prompted. "Go to sleep and dream about what you want to do right now, and I just may wake you up with a surprise." She kissed him and he returned it wholeheartedly.

"Promise?" He asked.

"Mmm…you don't get promises. Promises take the fun out of possibilities," Michonne said. Daryl seemed satisfied enough and rolled over. Michonne tried to go to sleep too.

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"So what do you want to do?" Tyreese asked when they were alone. Carol turned to face him. She looked like a girl in the lamplight. Tyreese could see on her face that same look of expectation she gave him when she expected him to kiss her, mixed with something else he hadn't quite seen before. She didn't respond to him, so he took his chances and kissed her. She returned the kiss, more confidently than she had before. She broke it long enough to get to her knees and then kissed him again, pushing against him. From the force, Tyreese thought he had a pretty good idea of what was on her mind, and he wasn't displeased at all. She wasn't going to ask for it. That wasn't her style, but she was showing him the best she could that she expected it, just like she'd expected all those kisses hello and goodbye.

"You got a room?" He asked, breaking away and smiling at her.

"She smiled at him and nodded, still not saying anything. He got to his feet and helped her up, picking up the lamp and following her upstairs.

Carol's room was simple. Nothing in the way of decoration at all. Tyreese put the lamp on the bedside table beside a stack of books. Carol sat on the bed. She still wasn't saying anything and Tyreese wondered if she even could say anything at this point.

He sat down and kissed her again, his hand on the back of her head, pulling her toward him. With the other hand he started peeling off the jacket she was wearing, and wondered how many layers he had to go through.

Carol responded by helping Tyreese peel off her protection from the cold air. Seeing that she was helping him, he started to peel off his own. Finally they were both down to their underwear, and cold, but it wasn't deterring either of them. Carol made a move to blow out the lamp.

"Don't," Tyreese said, stopping her, "I like it. I want to see."

Carol swallowed hard, but didn't blow out the lamp. Tyreese reached around fumbled with her bra and she finally reached up and helped him. He spent a few minutes, kissing her breasts and her stomach. Her moaning spurring him on. She hadn't said a thing, but the sounds escaping her lips right now, told him more than enough.

There were scars on her, the texture of the skin felt different against his lips than the rest of her. Burns, he thought, several of them were circle shaped burns. He stopped kissing her for a minute, absentmindedly. He was angry that someone had done that to her.

"What? What is it?" Carol panted. It snapped Tyreese out of his thoughts.

"Nothing," he said. He returned to kissing her and the moaning started back up again. He removed her panties finally. He looked at her and her eyes were closed. She was lost in her own thoughts. When he'd placed his hand between her legs it was really only to get an idea of how ready she was, and how tight, but she'd responded to his finger in such a way that he continued to pleasure her, watching her face the entire time. She was tight, and he had a good feeling that it wouldn't be that great for her when he joined her in what she was feeling right now, so he came to the resolution to give this to her. He'd let her have this round all to herself.

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Michonne hadn't fallen asleep in time and now she realized just how thin the walls were. Carol's muffled moans were invading the room. Luckily Daryl was snoring next to her and wasn't aware at all of what was going on around him. Michonne lie on her side, realizing what Carol had probably had to listen to all those nights.

When Carol cried out, Michonne jumped, and Daryl woke up.

"What the hell was that?" He asked, starting to get up.

"Daryl, lie back down. It's Carol," Michonne said.

"I know it's Carol," Daryl said sleepily. "I'm goin' to see what the fuck happened."

"Lie down. Tyreese is with her," Michonne said. Daryl got back in bed, confused for a moment but later figuring out what was taking place in the other room. It was silent now except for muffled talking.

"Are they…" Daryl started.

"Yep," Michonne responded. "Although he is either very quiet or was just taking care of her first."

Daryl moaned. "Shit, 'Chonne, don't say shit like that. Now you done got me thinkin' 'bout stuff I'd rather not think about."

Michonne giggled. "You'll be fine, Daryl. Lie down and try to go to sleep anything else happens."

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Tyreese watched Carol for a few minutes after her body stopped spasming. She was still trembling a little, and she kept her eyes closed, trying to get her breath. Finally she opened them.

"Good?" He asked, smiling.

Carol smiled at him, snickering a little. "Yeah, real good," she said. "But what about you?"

"Well, I was getting to that," Tyreese started. "Listen, you're pretty tight and…"

Carol stopped him. "I know, I've got to get used to it again," she said, "but we've got to start somewhere."

"I just don't want to hurt you," Tyreese said.

She smiled at him, leaning up to kiss him. "I'll understand," she whispered in his ear, pulling him toward her.

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The next time Carol cried out Michonne jumped again and Daryl sat up again.

"Christ! What the fuck is he doin' to her?" Daryl said. Michonne shooshed him.

"I'm guessing that it's Tyreese's turn," Michonne said as the noises from both of them continued.

"Sounds like he's fuckin' murderin' her," Daryl said.

"She's got to get used to it," Michonne said. "He's not doing anything to her that she doesn't want, at least in some way. She'll get more accustomed to it."

"Shit, I don't know what's worse, 'Chonne, that sound or you narratin' it for me," Daryl said.

They were both quiet for a while, the sounds continuing.

"Are they ever gonna fuckin' stop that?" Daryl asked finally.

"Well, it certainly isn't a pharmacy run," Michonne said with a giggle. "I guess he had a little foresight."

"That ain't funny, 'Chonne!" Daryl said.

"It is funny, Daryl," Michonne responded. "You've redeemed yourself a million times over, I think we can laugh about that one time."

"Well I'm gettin' sick of hearin' this," Daryl said.

"Carol's heard us a million times, I guess now it's our turn to pay the fiddler," Michonne responded. She handed Daryl her pillow. "Here, bury you're head between the pillows. I'll let you know when it's through."

When the noises did finally stop in the other room, the loudest of the final noises coming from Tyreese, Michonne tapped Daryl on the shoulder.

"It's over now and I want my pillow back," she said. He gave it to her.

"Yeah, I heard," he said.

"You better get to sleep, Daryl. I'm pretty sure they're done for the night, but you might want to go to sleep anyway, just in case they're not," Michonne said. She kissed him.

"'Chonne, I hope you wake up and give me that present you promised me," Daryl said. "I want to pay them back for that round of torture."

Michonne laughed at him. "I didn't promise anything, but I'll do my best. Try to sleep. I love you," she said, kissing him again.

"Love you too, 'Chonne," Daryl said, bunching his pillow up and burying his head down in it.

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AN: This one ended up being longer than I expected, but we covered a lot of ground for one day. I hope you liked it.

On another note, I'm going to plug a story for a friend of mine that some of you may find interesting. She's still getting going good, but it's a Daryl/Beth story (though like mine everyone is involved). It's updated nearly every day. EnglishPoet18 is her name and the story is Something Wicked This Way Comes. It could be interested for some of you multi-shippers out there.


	49. Chapter 49

"Well, good morning, Dale Evans," Michonne said, approaching Carol.

Carol looked up at her, she was doing something under her cloak, but Carol couldn't really figure out what was going on there.

"What are you doing?" Carol asked.

Michonne laughed a little. "Hope is inside my shirt, under my cloak, and I'm trying to make this work out better for both of us. I'd feed her normally but I'm afraid my breasts will freeze off out here."

Carol laughed at her. "They might."

"Oatmeal and canned ham?" Michonne asked.

"You got it," Carol said.

"Mmm, I wish I could say that sounded delicious, but it doesn't, no offense," Michonne said.

"None taken," Carol responded.

"So?" Michonne asked after a second, obviously struggling with Hope who was protesting, although her cries were muffled.

"So what?" Carol asked.

"So, tell me about it, as if I didn't already know. You're looking a little stiff there," Michonne said snickering. She sat down on the grass and Carol threw an empty can at her.

"Is it really that obvious?" Carol asked. She blushed a little.

"No, I mean I'm sure you could just convince everyone that you got up this morning and went for a nice horseback ride before breakfast," Michonne ribbed. Carol made a face at her. "I'm serious, tell me. I want to know."

"I don't want to talk about it, Michonne," Carol said.

"That's a lie. Everyone wants to talk about it, and you're no different. Was it good? Was it what you wanted it to be?" Michonne pressed. Hope was obviously done and she struggled to get her out of her position and get her bra back into place without falling over in the grass, most of the snow having already melted away.

"Most of it was good. I'm pretty sore, though. I think we'll be taking at least a short break," Carol said.

Michonne laughed. "I think Daryl is scarred now. I guess we owe you an apology for all we make you listen to."

"It doesn't bother me, actually," Carol said. "In the prison it was bad, but you know that's because of all the squeaking cots. At the house I hardly notice it. In fact, I think I notice it more when y'all _don't_ do anything than when you do."

"Good morning, girls," Dora said, walking up. "Anything I can help with to get breakfast ready?"

"It's almost ready," Carol said. "You can have a seat with Michonne if you want. We're just gossiping."

Dora looked at Michonne, sitting on the grass.

"Oh, no, I'll stand. If I got down there it would take three or four people to get me back up," she said, laughing.

"Is Frank coming down to breakfast?" Carol asked. Some days he came, others he didn't.

"No, the old grump says he's tired and it's too cold to get out, so I'll take him something. Where's Judith?" Dora asked.

"Daryl has her," Michonne said. "She's hanging out with him until it's chow time."

"Which is right about now," Carol said, walking over and ringing the bell that they'd all come to know signaled that they had very little time to get down to headquarters if they wanted their meal at the peak of its goodness.

A tired Josh and Brenda were the first to join them, always hanging close by when it was almost breakfast time. It signaled a nice meal to them and the end of their night, which had essentially become the end of their day. They seemed to have no problem, though, with the fact that they'd been turned into more or less nocturnal animals.

They went straight into headquarters, both muttering a "good morning" as they sauntered past. Carol pulled Michonne to her feet.

"Do you have any milk left?" Carol asked.

"Always do," Michonne responded.

"Get in the kitchen and pump some then. We can make the girls some rice cereal," Carol commanded. Michonne didn't say anything, but she did start toward the house.

Dora heaved up one of the big pots and Carol got the other. They both headed toward the house so that Carol could start rationing out food onto plates for everyone that would pile in waiting for their share.

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"We're gonna start on that house today," Daryl said. He was sitting at the table, alternating between eating his own breakfast and trying to force Hope to eat the same bite of cereal over and over. He'd put it in her mouth, and she'd spit it right back out. Michonne thought it was funny to watch them. She got annoyed when Hope would play this "not going to eat it game," but Daryl had infinite patience with her.

"Do you really think we're going to be able to do it?" Maggie asked. "I mean that's a lot of work."

"It's a lot of work, and we'll have to take turns, but I think it can be done. I may need y'all to go out on a tool run soon, though. I wanna see what it looks like we're gonna need and then I'll send y'all out," Daryl responded.

"No problem," Maggie said. "Anything we can do to help."

"We've got a couple of sledgehammers already, and we've scrounged up some crowbars and wheelbarrows, but I'm guessing the more we have the better. If we get more people working then it won't take so long. We could make real progress," Tyreese said.

"And more space means more food as soon as we can start plantin'," Daryl said.

"And more food means more time," Glenn added.

Dominique listened to the conversation. In all his groups before they'd spent all their time traveling. The way to stay alive was not to stay still. In this group, however, the dynamic was different. They were like ants. Work involved going out to find things and bringing them all back to the colony. There was _always_ something to do here. You could get heavy lifting jobs, or you could get some of the simpler jobs, but you always had a job. Granted, they were often given days to rest and have fun, and those were really nice, but for the most part, you were hustling. The job they had ahead of them sounded like a monster to do, but in a way Dominique didn't mind. He slept well here, in an actual bed, and he ate well. He also felt safe while he was doing his jobs, sleeping in his bed, and eating hot food. There was something to be said about that. It was something they weren't familiar with any longer in his other groups.

"Are we all gonna start on the house first or are we gonna split up between the house and the street?" He asked. He'd never swung a sledgehammer before, but it sounded like he was going to be doing a lot of it in his very near future.

Daryl stopped what he was doing a minute. "I reckon' we're gonna split up. I mean realistically it's gonna take us a while to do either of 'em, but it'd be better if we was workin' through both at the same time."

"Carol, is there any of that ham left?" Dominique asked. He decided he needed the best breakfast he could get for what they were going to be doing today.

Carol smiled at him and took his plate. Dominique realized he'd very seldom seen her consume a meal sitting down. She mostly stayed on her feet, serving everyone else and stealing bites of her own food when she got the chance. It made Dominique think about his grandmother. She'd been the same way with him and his siblings, his mother having died when he was four. When she brought his plate back to him, still smiling, he thanked her. He tried to be sure he always thanked her when she did something for him. _That_ was another thing his grandmother had taught him. Manners were always important, and he was sure that even though life had turned out like this, his grandmother would still not expect any less of him.

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Dora took a plate of food down to Frank and then joined Michonne and Carol to finish washing dishes. Everyone else was already wandering around, accomplishing the various tasks to which they'd been assigned.

Daryl had already taken Judith down to "Frank's Nursery" as he called it, but Michonne was wearing Hope around at the time, the little girl not being entirely in the mood to be separated from her. She had her moments, from time to time, when she would go to Daryl, but she didn't want anyone else. Michonne didn't push her, she liked having her close to her, and secretly she enjoyed it a little when Hope protested the others, since sometimes it seemed like the girls had no preference at all about who they were with. She knew that Carol secretly enjoyed it to when Judith demanded that no one else touch her.

"What are you doing today?" Dora asked Carol.

"Me? I've got some work to do in storage. There's still a mess in there, and Rachel is cleaning out some houses for me, so that means more will be coming in," Carol responded.

"I'm going down to get in on the demolition team," Michonne said.

"If you don't have anything pressing for me to do, I think I'll just stay with Frank and the girls," Dora said. The cold isn't being too kind to him and he might need a little help, especially now since Hope is starting to fine tune her ability to scoot," Dora said.

"That's fine." Carol said. "It helps more than you know to have you two to take care of the girls during the day. It saves me from running around with my hands full all day, trying to keep up with them, and now that they're doing demolition work, it really isn't practical or safe for Michonne to try to take Hope with her."

"I love the little angels. I think if I had granddaughters, I'd want them to be just like those two," Dora said.

"Did you have grandchildren?" Carol asked.

"I have a grandson," Dora said. She refused to speak of her family in past tense. She didn't know for sure what had happened to them when everything happened, but she wasn't going to write them off. She and Frank had made it this far, and she was no spring chicken and Frank was a good deal older than her, so she couldn't very well imagine that none of her family had made it through. She half-heartedly hoped to find them appearing at the gates one day, just as they had, and just as Dominique had. What a reunion that would be!

Carol nodded at Dora. "You weren't with your family when all this started, I guess?"

"No, we were on vacation. They lived spread out anyway. My kids all flew the coup as soon as they could, and Frank and I moved to Florida. We started traveling. We both love to travel. Rode around in an RV. Frank loved to drive that thing and we stopped everywhere, collecting spoons," Dora said. "Now I don't even know where we live." She chuckled.

"I'm almost positive we're still in Georgia," Carol said.

"We are," Michonne said. She was quiet for a minute. "The town next to this is where I used to live." She thought a minute and then laughed a little. "I've almost gone in a circle since I started roaming."

They finished the dishes and Carol doused what was left of the breakfast fire with the water. Michonne kissed Hope, freeing her from the wrap. Hope laughed at her.

"Dora, I think she's full," Michonne said, "but if she's not, I'll be on the other end of the community if you need me."

"She'll be fine," Dora said, taking the little girl. Hope protested at first, but Dora kissed her neck, tickling her and distracting her from the fact that her mother was walking away without having been given permission. "Carol, do we have any extra blankets in storage? I was hoping to get a few. I've put some down on the floor for the girls to play on, but I'd like a few more to keep thrown around for wrapping up," she said.

"We've got more than enough. Come on, I'll get you some," Carol said. Dora followed her across the street to the storage house.

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On the far side of the community, some people were working, some people were resting, and others were surveying the work to be done.

"Right about now, I'm wishin' more of them damn teenagers would show up," Daryl said to Tyreese, wiping the sweat from his forehead. "It's fuckin' freezin' out here and I'm sweatin' like they ain't no tomorrow."

"I know what you mean," Tyreese said, taking a drink of water. Carol had been back and forth bringing them water, only once stealing a few of their workers to send out for more.

"Man I'm gon' be hungry tonight!" Daryl said, laughing. "Take a break, woman!" Daryl called at Michonne. He'd tried to give her one of the easier jobs, but she'd insisted on breaking up pavement with a sledgehammer, insisting that her back and shoulders were probably stronger than those of most of the people out there. Right now, her face was literally dripping sweat. "You don't gotta bust the whole damn street up in one day," he called.

"In a minute," she responded. Her voice strained.

Glenn came out the house with another armload of wood and put it into one of the wheelbarrows they'd lined up. The brick they could salvage they were going to pile up, with the intention of doubling the strength of the fence when someone got the urge to do some brick laying. The wood they were going to pile up to be used as firewood or whatever else they needed it for.

Tyreese had already decided he was using some of the material to build a nice little shed for Carol to keep wood in. A covered shed would keep more if it dry and save her trouble on damp days.

"I think we've made a very bad mistake giving Maggie an axe," Glenn said, coming over for water. "She's enjoying it way too much. She's tearing down walls like crazy in there, and frankly it's making me a little afraid for my life." He laughed.

"You? I've already decided that if Michonne had half a mind to she could take up beatin' on me." Daryl said. Glenn laughed at him.

"Goggles," Glenn said.

"Huh?" Daryl responded.

"When we go on the run we need safety goggles. There's too much stuff flying around out here and we don't need somebody getting blinded," Glenn said, still trying to get his breath.

"You got a point there," Tyreese said.

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Carol was trying to figure out what to make for dinner. Her crew was going to be hungry. With the exception of Dora and Frank, who were watching the girls, Sasha and Stella, who were watching the gates, and Carl and Rachel, who were cleaning out houses, everyone else was going to be famished. Every time she'd gone down there to check on them she was more and more impressed by the progress they'd made in such a short amount of time.

The bloodcurdling screams that she heard echoed even in the house, and Carol ran out the door without thinking, terrified of what was causing them. She ran out into the street and looked around, trying to figure out where they had come from. It didn't take her long to notice, just a few doors down, Dora running down the porch steps, still issuing the cries, both of the girls howling along with her. Carol took off in a run, unsure of if anyone else could hear them, and still not entirely sure what was causing the almost inhuman screams.

"Help! Help!" She screamed as she ran toward them.

She saw Dora fall, the girls going down with her, and then Carol noticed Frank, coming out of the house, except he wasn't Frank _anymore_. Carol bounded past Dora, afraid that what used to be Frank would make it somehow down the porch steps and after his prey. She ran up the steps, toward, him reaching for her knife.

_Shit!_ Finding the holster empty she realized that it had been sometime since she'd carried the knife, and now she had just run _toward_ a fresh Walker unarmed. She turned as quickly as she could, almost falling, trying to get back down the steps before he could make a grab at her.

The shot rang out just as Carol was bounding off the last step. She didn't know where it had come from, but the growling behind her ceased.

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When the shot rang out, no one had known what to do at first. It was like everyone had frozen.

It was just a shot, a single, solitary shot. They'd heard nothing else.

Michonne's stomach flip flopped and she dropped the hammer she was holding, breaking out into a run back across the community. Whatever it was, it couldn't be Hope and it couldn't be Carol. _It just couldn't be._ She was completely unaware of the others that were running behind her, and unaware that her body was protesting the speed that she was demanding of it.

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When Carol got her senses back, she thanked Carl who had apparently been nearby in his traipsing back and forth with boxes and had the quickness to put Frank down before he'd descended upon her.

When Carol got to Dora and the girls, there was no reason to ask if she'd been bit. She clearly had several times. She was soaked in blood, and so were the howling children. Carol didn't really know what to do for a minute, she felt helpless. She wanted to check the girls, praying that the blood that covered them wasn't their own, and she also didn't know what to do about Dora, who was shaking, sobbing, and very obviously suffering.

Carl rushed over and Carol quickly passed him Judith. Michonne came up behind her, gasping for breath to the point that she was incapable of even speaking, she was grabbing for Hope and Carol passed her the baby.

Carol turned her attention to Dora, moving around to support her head on her lap. Carol was crying, and she couldn't control it. She stroked Dora's hair.

"I thought he was taking a nap," Dora sputtered. "I tried to keep him away from the girls."

"Judith's not bit," Carl said softly.

"Hope's not bit, either." Daryl said, gasping. He'd taken the baby from Michonne, who looked like she might pass out if she didn't get more air.

Dora half smiled up at Carol, before wincing again. "They're OK," she said.

Carol just nodded at her, trying to smile. She knew that it wouldn't be long, Dora was bleeding out quickly.

"They're safe. You kept them safe," Carol said, when she could finally find her voice. She continued to stroke Dora's hair. Dora didn't say anything else, she just looked up at Carol until she finally drew her last breath. Carol sat there a minute, still holding her head, waiting to make sure that it was really the final one.

Finally she felt someone pulling on her arm. It was Tyreese. He helped her to her feet and pulled her to him.

"Come on," he said softly. He pulled her towards headquarters, she was still not entirely sure of her surroundings. Her knees were shaky and he had to support most of her weight to keep her from falling to the ground.

Carol jumped when she heard the gunshot behind her.

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Daryl looked around the room at dinner. The air was so heavy that you could cut it with a knife. Michonne had barely eaten, and was now sitting, stroking Hope's face while she slept. Carol hadn't made dinner, nor had she served it. Rachel had offered to do that while Glenn, Rick, and Daryl dug the graves, and with the help of Junior, Jimmy, and Dominque got the bodies laid to rest. They hadn't had a funeral, per se, but each of the teenagers that had known them best had said something, mostly paying a teary tribute to Frank and his quietness, recounting stories of the few times that he had entertained them with some exaggerated war story. They told about Dora's kindness, her mothering gentleness, and how she'd always had the ability to find the good in everything they'd been through. They told about the two bickering back and forth, but how you could always tell that there was a love there that neither one had to speak about. Daryl didn't know it until tonight, but apparently the two had been together since Dora had been 15 years old.

_I guess it's only fittin' that they go together._ Daryl thought, sadly. It made him think about Michonne, and how much he loved her. He'd want to go with her, or shortly after, because he couldn't imagine now what it would it be to live without her. Dora had wanted to save the girls, and she had done that, sacrificing herself in the process. Daryl thought, though, that she probably hadn't minded the sacrifice so much, because it meant that she didn't have to learn to live without Frank. He had been a crotchety old coot, but there must have been something to him to make her go on loving him for all those years.

The teenagers weren't taking this loss well at all. Anyone could see that. They'd all sort of bunched together, Jimmy and Junior were especially sore, and had muttered several times that neither of them would be alive if it hadn't been for Frank's guidance when they were on their own. It was a hard blow, to everyone. They'd known it before, but now it was especially obvious. You could die in your sleep and take out someone that you loved without ever knowing it, without ever realizing that you would be their killer.

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Michonne had insisted that Hope sleep with them, and Daryl hadn't fought her on it at all. Now, Michonne was asleep, and so was Hope, curled up against her mother's body. Daryl couldn't sleep, so he'd been lying there, his head on his arm, watching both of them and listening to their breathing. He was sad about all that had happened today, sad to realize that Dora's laughter, her chatter was gone. It wouldn't be entertaining them at breakfast anymore. He was even sad that Frank's grunts that constituted most conversations were gone now. Daryl had been fond of him, seeing how the old man put on such a front of being strong, of not really caring about anything, but then catching, every now again, the smiles that he offered to the two little girls that he'd spent a lot of his time coddling and entertaining.

More than the sadness, though, Daryl felt thankful that he was able to be here right now, watching Michonne and Hope sleep. He didn't want to imagine what this night would be like if, when he had taken Hope from Michonne, terrified, he hadn't found that the blood that coated his daughter had belonged to Dora. That was something he couldn't bear to think about.

Daryl finally leaned over and kissed Michonne, who didn't stir at all, and then gently kissed Hope on the forehead, trying to get the sleep that his body was screaming for but his mind was trying to avoid.

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AN: OK, that was hard to write. I think I need some chocolate now, and a hug.


	50. Chapter 50

They had taken the day for mourning. Carol had suggested it at breakfast, seeing that Jimmy and Junior didn't even come to eat, and Daryl had nodded his agreement. Everyone would do with the day what they wanted, what they needed to do, in order to come to terms with the group's loss. If they wanted to work, if that's what was best for them, then they were welcome to do it, but he wouldn't expect anyone to keep working.

_Mourning_, Michonne thought, _what a luxury_. She didn't know how she felt entirely. She was dealing with so many emotions that she was finding it difficult to pinpoint any one of them exactly. She had bathed Hope twice since it all happened. Once the night before, and once this morning. She'd made sure that the water was the perfect temperature, heating just a little too hot before she brought it in, so that when it cooled it would be exactly right. Now Hope was sleeping on her chest, and she was leaning into the arm of the sofa. The smell of baby lotion hanging in the air.

Daryl had gone to work. Michonne knew that was what he needed. She needed the quiet and he needed to be doing something, anything. They hadn't really talked about what happened yet, she couldn't really talk about it yet, and she knew that Daryl was still processing everything. For as easy going and laid back as he could be, Michonne had no illusions about the fact that Daryl was terribly complex when it came to processing his emotions. He'd been a little distant this morning, offering her a kiss, kissing Hope, but not really saying anything else as he slipped out the door to go to work after walking her home from breakfast. She didn't take it personally. His distance had nothing to do with them, and it had everything to do with the fact that he still didn't know how he felt or what he wanted to say about it.

Carol was working too. Michonne had stepped out on the porch earlier and seen her, wandering about, doing everything and nothing all at the same time. Tyreese had taken to quietly following her around, helping Judith keep up, like a shadow. _Keep the family going_. Michonne thought. That was Carol's mantra, and the way she lived every day. Michonne suspected that something in Carol thought that if she never stopped doing all the little things that she did, they'd all make it. They _did_ depend on her, not for the big things, but for the little things. The things that made this life seem uncomplicated, even though deep down they knew that it wasn't. Carol wasn't going to be the one to save them from a herd of Walkers, and she wasn't going to be the one to solve their problems, but she was the one that offered them hot bath water, the one that made sure that food magically appeared in front of them throughout the day, the one that made sure that they got some luxury, some treat in their ration boxes from time to time. She was just there, quietly tending to the little things, ignoring the fact that most of her efforts were taken for granted.

Michonne sighed. In her sleep, Hope was twitching. Michonne rubbed her back gently, hoping that whatever she was dreaming about was a good dream, and not something about the horror she'd been witness to the day before. In response, she stopped twitching and started making sucking noises. Michonne smiled at her. She was torn, although she was sad to know that Frank and Dora were gone, just like that, she was grateful that she wasn't suffering in the same manner that some of the others were. She had been petrified, running across the community, that she would find a grisly scene, which she had, but that it would have stripped her of her precious daughter, or even of Carol, who she realized now had become more important to her than she'd imagined she ever would. She felt a little guilty for the relief that she had felt when she'd seen Carol there, unnerved but unharmed, and when she'd explored Hope's tiny body, finding nothing more than a scrape on her leg, likely caused when Dora had fallen with her, Judith having suffered similar scrapes.

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"You know, I could carry something," Tyreese said, following along behind Carol. She had her hands full with plates of food that she was carrying to Jimmy and Junior.

"You are carrying something," Carol said.

Tyreese was carrying Judith on his hip. She'd been trying to toddle behind Carol, but was pleased to find that he had an easier time keeping in step with Carol than she did, and now she was just hanging on him, using him as a transportation system. Whenever he'd stop for any reason she'd point at Carol and fuss at him, like he'd temporarily forgotten his job.

Carol tried not to pay attention to it, but she couldn't miss the blood in the street, and on the porch of the house as she went toward the door. It was like a crime scene, except it wasn't under any kind of investigation.

"Knock, please," She said to Tyreese. He obediently knocked on the door. They waited a few minutes, but no one came to the door. Tyreese knocked again. "Open it," Carol said finally. Tyreese opened the door and they stepped inside.

"Dear Lord!" Carol said, looking around the living room. "Jimmy, Junior, are you up there?" She called up the stairs. There was no response, so she started up the stairs with Tyreese following behind her.

"Juju!" Judith called out.

At the top of the stairs all the doors were closed, but Carol could hear muffled sounds from behind one of the doors. She walked over to it.

"Jimmy, Junior, open up," she said. "I'm not going away, so you might as well open the door."

A few minutes later a red eyed Jimmy opened the door, sniffing. He didn't say anything, just stood there a minute.

_They were Dora and Frank's boys, now I guess they're my boys._ Carol thought.

She pushed in the room. They'd apparently both been sitting on the bed together and the roll of toilet paper and the scattered tissues told her that they'd been hiding away from everyone, crying out their feelings. Both were sniffling now.

"You don't have to hide it from me," Carol said. She put the plates of food on their dresser and sat down on the bed next to Junior, putting her arm around him. "Come here," she said softly, reaching an arm toward Jimmy. He sat next to her and she hugged them both. Tyreese stood to the side with Judith, watching them. "We all cry sometimes. I'm not one of those people that's crazy enough to buy into the old story that _real _men don't cry. I've seen some of the greatest men I've known cry since all this happened. I don't see why you two should be any different. You cared about them and you lost them. That will make anyone cry."

Both the boys were crying now, quietly, and she continued to hug them. They didn't want to talk about it and she understood that. She caught herself tearing up as well.

Judith sucked her finger and rested her head on Tyreese's chest. He wondered what she must be thinking about all of this. She _knew_ Dora and Frank. She might not understand where they had gone, but she would notice that they weren't there anymore.

"Jimmy, if you want, you can move into our house," Tyreese offered. "Both of you can. There's an extra bedroom."

"Or I could help you get your own place set up if you'd like that," Carol said softly. "Or you can stay here, I could help you clean it up. Whatever you'd like better."

"I think I'd we're going to take the extra room with Dominique, Stella, and Chelsea," Junior said after a minute, finally controlling himself. He was sniffling again.

"OK," Carol said, "you need to eat something, and then we'll help you take your stuff over there."

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"I had a feeling you might be down here," Rick said, stepping into the house they were tearing down. Daryl was in there finishing up some of what Maggie had left undone in the downstairs. He stopped when Rick walked up.

"Yeah man, just wanted to get my mind on somethin', you know? Tryin' to figure out how we gonna actually _do_ this. Don't seem as easy now as it did when we started." Daryl said.

Rick looked around. The problem with how they were going to actually do this was that they'd jumped into doing it without much of a plan, none of them really knowing where to start. How do you tear down a two story house by hand?

"I think the key is going to be going from the top down. Before we compromise any of the structure on the bottom floor," He offered.

"I think you're right. Last damn thing we want is the fuckin' roof fallin' in on somebody's head," Daryl said.

Rick could see that Daryl was thinking, and that he was thinking about more than just how they were going to continue with the project in front of them. He had to admit that to this point the group was making what seemed like good decisions. The plan was solid, and since they'd come here there had only been a few slip ups, but it was those slip ups that were worrying Daryl.

"Listen, Daryl, I know I haven't exactly been the most supportive, or the most helpful about things, but if you want to talk about everything, I'm still here for you," Rick said finally.

Daryl scratched his head, leaning on the axe handle.

Rick had been a good friend to him, and before he'd taken his little vacation into insanity, he'd been a pretty reliable person. It had just been too much for him, losing Lori and gaining Judith, whose paternity everyone questioned, all at the same time. He couldn't balance that with the threat of the Governor and with all the other stress and strain that came along with feeling like you were responsible for so many lives.

Daryl could understand, to some degree, how Rick had gone off the edge like he had. He was back now, or at least it seemed that way, and Daryl figured that he'd finally come to terms with things. Daryl didn't know if he could say the same thing wouldn't happen to him if he lost Michonne or Hope.

"It's OK, man, I don't hold nothin' against ya," Daryl said. "You just weren't thinkin' clear."

Daryl's mind wasn't as clear today as he wanted it to be. That's why he was working. Working distracted him, at least a little, and kept him from thinking about all the different ways that things could have gone wrong the day before. It kept him from thinking about all the different ways that things could go wrong in the future.

"I almost lost my little girl, you know," Daryl said. He wasn't sure how Rick would respond. Since the day that Daryl had punched him in the face, the two of them had avoided most conversation about Michonne or Hope. To Daryl's surprise, however, there was absolutely no negativity that came from Rick at this moment. He put his hand on Daryl's shoulder and squeezed.

"The important thing is that you _didn't_ lose her," Rick said.

He had to admit to himself that even he'd become comfortable here. This plan could open up space for them to grow food. Carol was going to can whatever they didn't eat so that none of it would go bad. It would buy them a lot of time here. As he'd been settling down, clearing his mind, allowing himself to grieve for Lori, grieve for the life that he was never getting back, he was realizing also that this life wasn't as dire as it had once seemed. Daryl had been right the day that he'd said they were going nowhere, and it didn't matter how long it took them to get there. Rick could see that now. Maybe somewhere out there someone had reconstructed the world they'd known before, but there was no need to rush after it when they didn't know where they were going. They were only buying time, Rick was still certain of that and yesterday's events had reconfirmed that, but at least it seemed like they were buying more of it than they maybe would have before. He was beginning to think that maybe Carl was going to have a chance to grow up, maybe even a chance to get old. The life they were living wasn't normal to them, but it was as close to normal as it could be for Carl, and for Judith.

"You know, Daryl, you were right that day that you lost it with me," Rick ventured. "I did envy you your family, I guess I still do a little, but I'm happy for you that you didn't lose your daughter."

Daryl looked at Rick, studied him for a moment, and then went to absentmindedly biting the skin on his thumb, an action that he often did when he was thinking.

"You can't get Lori back, man, but you could still have a family," Daryl said. "You got your kids, you got Rachel."

Rick laughed a little. "Yeah, I've got Rachel," he said. He was quiet for a minute, a bit of a smirk still on his face. "I don't love Rachel, Daryl. You know that."

"You could learn to love her," Daryl offered.

Rick considered it for a minute. "I don't think it's the same," he said. "And I've got Carl, but I've got so much I need to make up to him. So much time that I need to make up to him."

"So make it up to him. We got time now, Rick. I don't know how much of it we got, but we got some," Daryl said. "He ain't a bad kid, but you better hurry up an' make him into the man you want him to be, 'fore the dough sets."

Rick nodded.

"You got Judith, it ain't too late for her neither," Daryl added.

Rick shook his head. "No, I don't have Judith," he said. "I can't even explain how I feel about her, yet. I don't even fully understand it myself. I'm _starting_ to understand it, but it I'm not sure yet. Sometimes I look at her and I resent her," he finished.

"What you resent Judith for? She ain't done nothin' to nobody," Daryl said.

"I told you that I don't understand it yet. I was so mad at Lori, for so many things, and Judith just reminds me of that," Rick said. "I've let Judith go, I had to. She's where she belongs now. She's better off just growing up thinking that Carol is her mother. It'll be easier for her that way."

"What about Carl? What's he think about it?" Daryl asked.

"I don't know. I never asked him, and he hasn't said much about it. I think he knows that I just can't talk about it right now," Rick said.

Daryl thought about it. Maybe Rick just needed more time. Maybe these were all just baby steps for him. It was obvious that Rick wanted to talk to him, even though he didn't know what to tell him. Sometimes he felt like that too, sometimes he just needed to talk to Michonne, or to Tyreese, and he wasn't really expecting them to give him an answer. Maybe that's what Rick needed from him.

"Maybe you should talk to Carl about it sometime," Daryl ventured. "He's a good kid. I'm sure he'd understand, even if you don't."

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"Hey, you want to play a game?" Glenn asked. Beth had shut herself in her room. He hadn't ventured up there to see how she was dealing with things, but if she was anything like Maggie then it wasn't good. Dora and Frank's death had trudged up every feeling she had about losing her own parents, and some of those wounds were a little too fresh still. She'd spent most of the day in and out of fits of sobbing.

"No," she coughed out between sobs, "I don't want to play a game."

She was sitting in the floor, her knees drawn up to her chest, blowing her nose at intervals into the various handkerchiefs that he'd collected up for her.

Glenn wondered about his own parents sometimes, but Maggie had been forced to see hers go, and having seen Dora torn apart reminded her all too well of Hershel's sacrifice. Glenn sat beside her and pulled her to him.

"Those kids, the ones that travelled around with them," Maggie said, her sobbing calming for a bit, "losing them would be just like if we lost some of ours…Carl said Frank almost got Carol before he shot him. Glenn, we could have lost Carol yesterday. We could lose anyone at any time. It could even be us next time."

"Shh, don't think like that, Maggie," Glenn said. "We're safe right now. Don't think about who we might lose or you'll just sit here and make yourself sick. Frank was old, and Dora was too. We could live to be old, Maggie. We actually have a chance now."

Glenn knew these moods. They were a hopeless spiral. Maggie would cry about it, she'd worry herself sick over who they could lose, what it would be like to lose each person, and she'd go through the details of how their lives would change if they lost that person. She wouldn't stop until she'd been through all the grisly details…usually by then she'd be so exhausted that she'd fall asleep, and if they were lucky she'd wake up in another mood entirely, one where she was determined not to think about, one where she was determined to enjoy the life they did have. Glenn just wished sometimes that he could fast forward through the lows and get her back to the place where she didn't look at tomorrow as some drawn out funeral for everyone around them.

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Carol put Judith in her crib, and offered her a bottle of water, as she typically did. Judith immediately laid down with it. She'd been humming for a while and Carol knew she was ready to go to sleep. There would be no protest tonight. She'd spent most of the day either hanging on Tyreese or running after them when his hands had been occupied with other things. She was tired.

Behind her, Michonne was putting Hope down too. She was already asleep, having fallen asleep while being fed and never really waking up afterwards.

They hadn't talked much today. Really it seemed like no one was very talkative. Dinner had been a silent affair. Glenn had come for food for his household, Dominique had come for food for his, and everyone else had come to eat, but had left behind their desire for chitchat.

The past day's actions meant something different to everyone, and Carol realized that. She wasn't going to push anyone to talk about it if they didn't want to. Maybe tomorrow they'd all come creeping back out of their shells.

"Goodnight, Michonne," Carol said softly as she started out of the nursery, noticing that Michonne was just leaning on the side of the crib, looking at Hope. "I'll leave the lamp."

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When Michonne finally crawled in bed, Daryl was already softly snoring. She eased into the bed, trying not to wake him. He did wake, though, at the shifting of the mattress, long enough to put his arm around her and shift up against her. He kissed her neck, but didn't say anything, probably having already drifted back off to sleep.

Michonne closed her eyes and tried to sleep, listening to his breathing and feeling the comforting weight of his arm around her waist.


	51. Chapter 51

AN: So wow, we've made it 50 chapters, and we're still going! I'm kind of excited, actually. I hope a lot of you are still on board with me and ready to continue our little adventure.

On another note, real life is cranking into gear for a few days, so I might not be able to update until maybe Sunday or Monday. If I can sneak something in there for you, I will, but no promises. I'll be back to continue your regularly scheduled programming as soon as I can.

Enjoy and review if you get a chance, I love hearing your reactions and opinions.

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Their day of mourning had turned into a few days of mourning when Daryl finally called them all into headquarters for a serious meeting.

"Ok, I know that everyone has been sorta mopin' around these days, and I get that. We just got hit hard with a little bit of reality, and the sad truth is that every time that reality hits us, it's gonna hit us hard. That's all we got now is a harsh reality. We're pretty safe in here, but that don't mean we're totally safe. It just means we're safer than we have been before. I know losin' Dora and Frank was especially hard on you kids, but we can't just close up and give up now. We gotta lot of work that's needin' to be done, and we need to get on it if we don't want to have to be out there again, maybe losin' more people," Daryl said.

"He's right," Tyreese added, "we've got to keep going. Things like this are going to happen, but we can't shut down."

No one really spoke, but they all nodded in agreement.

"Maggie, Glenn, I need y'all to go on a run. See if you can't steal another delivery truck like you did when we was at the prison. Tyreese made a list of things we need and the more we have, the more we can get done," Daryl said. "You'll need hands, so take whoever you want with you."

Tyreese produced the list and gave it to Glenn who read it over.

"No problem," Glenn said. "After you hand out positions to everyone else, we'll pick who we're going to take."

"Beth, I want you to stay with Carol and do whatever she needs help with. Y'all are gonna have the kids, so, Carol, I thought you might want someone," Daryl said.

"That would be nice," Carol responded.

"I'm going to get to work building that woodshed," Tyreese threw in.

"Sounds fine. Dominique, I got a special job for you, so don't wander off. Everyone else, go with Glenn and Maggie if you're chosen. If not, you can either grab yourself a hoe and get to tearin' up them yards we designated or you can meet down at the house to start demolition work," Daryl finished.

"Fine, then Jimmy, Junior, and Sasha, can we steal you guys?" Glenn asked. "We have quite the load to bring back."

The three of them nodded their compliance.

"Michonne, can you top Hope off before you go? I don't want her getting hungry, and she's not always the most reliable about eating anything solid," Carol said. "I just don't feel like the battle right now."

"No problem," Michonne said. Daryl, who had been holding Hope, stood up and passed her the baby, kissing both of her cheeks before he handed her over.

"I'm headin' on down to the house with Dominique," Daryl said. "What you doin' today?"

"I haven't decided," Michonne said. "I'm leaning toward demolition work. I like swinging the sledgehammer more than I think I'd like hoeing."

"I reckon I'll see ya down there then," Daryl said, leaning in to kiss her.

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"Come with me, kid," Daryl said, walking out of headquarters with Dominique a step behind him.

"What kinda special plans you got for me?" Dominique asked.

"I'm gonna show ya, just hold your horses," Daryl responded. Dominique followed him over to storage where he produced a lamp, a pair of gloves, and a helmet. Dominique eyed him suspiciously. Daryl handed him the stuff.

"What's all this?" Dominique asked.

"Your equipment," Daryl responded.

"A helmet?" Dominique asked. He was more than a little worried about the job that Daryl seemed to have in mind for him.

"Yeah, Carol'd be pissed if you cracked your fuckin' head open, so you gonna wear a helmet," Daryl responded, still not slowing down. Dominique was nearly jogging to keep up with him.

"So what am I doin', exactly?" Dominique asked.

They finally arrived at the house they were tearing down and Daryl stopped.

"You're bustin' up the roof," he said.

"You mean I'm supposed to climb up there?" Dominique asked, looking up toward the roof.

"Nah, you're gonna do it from inside the attic. The helmet's so you don't go bangin' your head on any beams. You'll need the lamp at least until you get you some holes, and the face shield'll keep shit from blindin' you, and you got Glenn to thank for that. He's the one that come up with it when he thought it was gonna be him goin' up there. I'll get you an axe in the house," Daryl said.

"Why isn't it Glenn that's goin' up there?" Dominique asked timidly, following Daryl through the house, having acquired an axe at the entrance.

"'Cause Glenn is goin' on a run and you're goin' in the attic," Daryl responded.

"I'm a little claustrophobic," Dominique stuttered when Daryl led him up the stairs and to the ladder that led to the attic space.

"All the more reason for you to get to work bustin' you some holes, I reckon'. Listen you're the skinniest little runt we got around here, you'll have a lot more room up there than anyone else, now get on up the ladder. I'll be behind ya with the axe to get ya set up," Daryl said, gesturing up the ladder.

Dominque sighed and put his helmet on. He crawled into the attic and Daryl poked just his upper body through the hole, passing Dominque the axe and lighting the lamp. Dominique looked around what he could see of his space, and it appeared to be pretty much empty.

"Here ya go, kid. Get to work and you won't be in a little space no more," Daryl said, "and be careful you don't fall through," he added, disappearing back down the ladder and leaving Dominique to get to work.

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Glenn was happy, they'd found a sizeable truck without much problem, and luckily whoever had owned it before had refueled not long ago. They were loading things into it. They had nearly everything on the list and they had a lot of it, including a few items that they'd picked up, seeing them and thinking that they'd come in handy, even though they hadn't been on the list.

Sasha and Maggie were in the hardware store packing the last of the burlap sacks with smaller items, nails, screws, and whatnot.

Jimmy and Junior were busy hauling bags of cement to load into the truck, and Glenn was going over the list a final time to make sure that they had all they needed for a while.

That was when they caught his attention. Two scraggly looking men sauntered right past him as though he didn't exist and went into the hardware store. Glenn looked around for Jimmy and Junior, but they weren't in sight, having gone around back for another bag of cement. Glenn turned and stepped into the hardware store after the two drifters. They were very obviously drifters, they carried everything they probably owned on their backs.

Glenn wished he could have waited for Jimmy and Junior, having them as backup would be nice, but he didn't want Maggie and Sasha alone for long in the store with the two men. He had no doubt that they wouldn't hesitate to kill them if they needed to, but he didn't want them sneaking up on them. It took him a minute to locate them.

Both of the women were on guard, their knives out, but the scraggly men didn't seem threatened, though they were keeping their distance. Glenn kept quiet, pretty sure that they hadn't seen him outside, or hadn't paid much attention to him, and fairly confident that they didn't realize he was only a few feet away, behind them. He listened to the exchange that was taking place, trying to decide if he should go for Jimmy and Junior or if he should ambush them. He held his machete in his hand, wondering if today would be the day he had to kill a living man simply because he didn't like the looks of him. Earl had more than taught them that sometimes it was justifiable these days to kill people for the way they looked, because it was often a sign that this individual didn't need to be around any longer, and he wasn't taking any chances with Maggie there.

"Ain't you feisty little things," one of the men said.

"We ain't gonna hurt ya, you can calm down," the other one said.

Glenn stayed where he was, somewhat hidden from sight, though he was sure that Maggie had seen him. He switched hands with his machete, drying his right hand off on his pants and then taking it back. If they moved, he was going to kill them, he wasn't even going to think about it.

"We don't want no trouble," the first one offered. "We done seen enough trouble today."

Glenn jumped a little as Jimmy and Junior came up behind him. They were quiet, but both of them were wide eyed, probably not knowing what to expect when the found him there holding his machete. Knowing the two others were with him, he decided to finally begin to approach, and both men turned a little upon hearing the three of them walking up.

"What kind of trouble?" Maggie asked, relieved to see that she and Sasha had more than enough backup now.

"We runned up on a little settlement, you might say, they had them some pretty women there, but some of the men folk didn't wanna share, bein' greedy an' all, so we had us a little scuffle with 'em," the largest one said, laughing a little.

"We showed 'em, though, it was a shame to leave them pretty ladies without their men folk, but they didn't seem none too eager to come on with us, so we decided to just pass on through after we had our fun. That's when my brother and I noticed y'all just scufflin' 'round this place," the other said.

"Y'all settlin' somewhere 'round here?" The biggest brother asked. Maggie eyed Glenn nervously.

"We're a few towns over." He said, trying not to let the worry creep in that the settlement these two had found had been their community. Glenn thought about it. What were they going to do now? If they let their guard down at all, the two men could try something, obviously not being concerned at all about other survivors. If they let them go, if the men wanted to leave peacefully, they could follow them back to their community, if they hadn't been there already.

Glenn made up his mind, though he hated what he had decided. He wished that he could telepathically communicate with Maggie, wished that someone was there that he could discuss his idea with, and he wished more than anything that there was someone else there to make the call that he had to make but desperately didn't want to. However, there was no one else there, and he was going to have to make some kind of move.

Suddenly, machete grasped firmly in his hand, Glenn lunged at the larger of the men in front of him, hacking at him with the machete. Maggie must have seen it coming because she jumped and sliced the throat of the second man before Glenn had even fully been sure that he'd taken down the one that he was going after. In a matter of minutes the job was done. The two men lie lifeless on the floor, and Glenn tried to keep his mind clear as he assured himself that neither would resurrect as a Walker.

All five of them stood silently for a moment, looking back and forth between each other and the men on the floor. Finally it was Sasha who broke the awkward silence.

"Do we have everything we need?" She asked, strangely calm. She picked up one of the bags that was on the floor next to her.

"The truck's pretty well packed," Jimmy said, his voice squeaking a little.

"Then let's go, before we have any more unwelcomed visitors," Sasha said.

The group silently walked out of the store, finished loading the last of their items, took down the five or six Walkers ambling around in the street, and headed back.

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Daryl cheered Dominique on when he'd finally busted through the roof. Once he got through, he was making pretty good progress. Daryl had cleared the area out of workers so that he could throw down anything he wanted to throw down without worrying about hitting anyone with falling debris.

He could tell that the boy wasn't suffering from claustrophobia now. Now he was suffering from maybe ego, or maybe the feeling of accomplishment, but fear was the last thing he could see whenever he looked up there to check on him.

Daryl was helping Michonne break up asphalt and everyone else was working a few streets over on hoeing up the yards that they'd designated as planting areas. As much as they had needed the few days of break, Daryl thought that they needed the work too. They'd become accustomed to this life now, where you didn't really feel like you were living unless you were _doing_ something, and the more you did, the more alive you felt.

He tried to keep a feeling for the time passing, wondering when the group would get back from the run that he'd sent them on.

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Chelsea and Stella were on watch, and they pulled the gates open for the car that the group had left in and the truck that was rumbling not far behind it. They rushed to kill the Walkers that tried to follow it into the gate.

When it came to a stop, Sasha, Junior and Jimmy spilled out of the car. Glenn and Maggie got out of the truck. All of them looked a little different.

Tyreese stopped his work and came down to the street where they'd stopped the vehicles.

"How'd it go? Did you get everything?" He asked.

"We got everything," Sasha said. Tyreese furrowed his brow. There was something in her facial expression that he didn't entirely like.

"Everything go OK? Did you run into a herd?" He asked.

"No, no herds…" Glenn said.

"What's wrong?" Tyreese asked.

Glenn was positive that it wasn't their community that those two men had entered. He'd known that just seeing Stella and Chelsea lightly opening the gates. If those men had come through and left them without "their menfolk" and probably violated some of them, he knew that they wouldn't be milling around doing the everyday things that they did. Probably no one would be at the gates, and he was sure he wouldn't have been able to see Tyreese working, Beth entertaining the girls, or Carol hustling about with a load of laundry to hang. The men hadn't disturbed their community at all. _They had disturbed another one, but it hadn't been theirs._

"We killed two men today," Glenn said quietly. "In cold blood." His head spun when he thought about it. The men hadn't actually threatened them, but he'd not been able to wrap his mind around any other action to take then to kill them.

Tyreese looked confused. He looked to Sasha.

"They were talking about what they'd done to another settlement apparently somewhere close by," Sasha said. "They said they killed their men, and probably raped their women. They were shady, and they were asking us about where we were settled."

Tyreese nodded his head.

"I didn't know what else to do," Glenn said. "I didn't know if it was our group or another one, and I didn't want them following us back here. I just didn't know what to do, so Maggie and I killed them."

Tyreese clapped a hand on Glenn's shoulder. He could tell that the boy was disturbed.

"You did the right thing, Glenn. You did the only thing you could do, and we're all grateful to you for it. Don't lose any sleep over having to do something to protect your family," Tyreese said.

Glenn didn't say anything. He swallowed hard and looked at Tyreese, nodding slightly.

"Come on, let's get this truck unloaded," Tyreese said finally.


	52. Chapter 52

Things were coming along well, in Daryl's opinion. The past couple of weeks had been full of their share of breakdowns and coming around, but work was getting done and everyone was starting to settle down. The "kids", as he referred to the younger generation of members, were slowly becoming acclimated to the group.

Glenn had been through a bit of a rocky spot after he and Maggie had killed the drifters that they encountered. Daryl had to have a few conversations with him, convincing him that he wasn't becoming some kind of monster, that _they_ had been the monsters. He would have thought that Maggie would have had a hard time with it, but surprisingly she seemed to feel no remorse whatsoever over ridding them of their lives.

The news of another settlement in the area had also been a topic of some interest to Daryl. He wondered how many there were and where exactly they were located. He wondered if they'd ever appear at the gates, or if on some kind of run they might stumble upon them. Daryl didn't know how he felt about the possibility of encountering another group, especially another large one. On the one had the fear of another Governor was a very real fear for everyone. If the other settlement wasn't a peaceful one, then they could have problems. If they _were_ peaceful, then they might want to join up with them. Though numbers could be seen as a good thing, they could also be a bad thing. Numbers meant more hands and they meant more work could be done, but they also meant a drain on supplies, which could shorten how long they could sustain a larger group.

Daryl worried about the other groups out there a good bit. He worried about them probably more than he worried about the Walkers they encountered. Walkers were predictable to some degree. In small numbers you knew you could deal with them. In herds there was more of a risk, but at least you knew what they were after, and you knew what they were doing. They were just stupid hunks of rotting flesh that wanted to eat you. People were far less predictable.

Their demolition was coming along better than they'd planned. The one house was almost completely down and they'd begun on another. The biggest worry that they had was now that they were tearing the houses down, the stuff had to go somewhere. Glenn had taken to driving cars outside the gates, just far enough that he didn't have too far to walk to get back, and then Maggie would stand watch over him while he siphoned the remaining fuel out of the tanks for their own use. The pavement they tore up, the useless hunks of cement and other debris that came from the deconstruction of the house was slowly being cleaned up and wheel barrowed outside of the community. This was somewhat worrisome because it meant increased time with the gates open, and it meant people spending more time outside the gates than they were always comfortable with.

Still, the work had to be done and the space that they were clearing, although it was only slowly being cleared, was important to all of them. The promise of spring coming kept them spurred on, dreaming about how much fresh food they'd be able to grow.

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Daryl worried a lot, but today it was difficult to be worried. It was a lazy, rainy day and his house was filled with entertainment.

Tyreese and Carol were sitting in the floor playing with a bunch of toys they'd found for the girls. Michonne was sitting on the couch with Stella sitting on the floor between her legs, and she was doing her hair. Dominique sat on the other end of the couch, and was telling them all kinds of funny stories about college, about all the things they'd done before the Walkers had come. The days when worry for them was more about passing biology and less about living through the night.

Daryl liked listening to everyone talk and laugh. It relieved a lot of his concerns, at least temporarily.

Daryl called to Hope and she turned, grinning at him. She had four teeth. It seemed to him that they'd showed up almost overnight, but he thought they were the cutest things he'd ever seen, and she didn't mind showing them off. She seemed to be constantly grinning. Hope was beating two wooden blocks together, and Daryl could see that she had Judith's attention. The two had developed a sort of sibling rivalry at times. Judith was now becoming pretty well known for the habit she'd developed of not having any interest in an item until Hope had possession of it. Then it was the one thing that Judith simply _must_ have, and she would frequently take things away from her, earning herself a scolding from Carol.

As Daryl suspected, Judith went in for the attack and snatched away one of the blocks that she was now coveting before Carol could notice what she was doing. Hope looked surprised, and then she got upset.

"Judith!" Carol scolded. Judith looked at her but didn't say anything. "Give that back, right now, you have plenty of stuff to play with."

"Mine," Judith responded.

"No, not yours. Give that back to Hope right now," Carol said.

Daryl laughed. Judith reluctantly returned the toy, but the look that she shot Carol was her best angry face.

"Come here, look what I've got," Tyreese said, showing Judith a Jack in the Box that he'd produced from the box of toys they were going through. She walked over to him and he helped her to sit on his lap. He put it in front of her and wound the crank. Hope too, looked at it, interested in the music it produced. Both girls were enthralled for a second, until Jack made his appearance. Then they both wailed. Tyreese comforted Judith, and Hope abandoned her blocks and crawled toward Michonne.

"Come here, Hope," Daryl said. She crawled over to him and he scooped her up, comforting her. "They don't like that one."

"Yeah, apparently it's not the hit of the party," Tyreese said.

"I never liked those things anyway," Stella said. "They always scared me."

"You know what always scared me?" Michonne asked. "Toast popping out of the toaster."

Everyone laughed.

"I'm serious, I mean I knew it was coming, but it never ceased to make me jump," She said.

"It used to be toast popping up, and now it's Walkers popping up," Carol said. "I think I prefer the toast."

"At least the toast wasn't trying to eat you when it popped up," Dominique added.

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The next day, Michonne opted out of demolition work for the day, switching off with Beth to help Carol with the laundry and the girls.

"So thanks for last night, by the way," Michonne said while they were scrubbing.

"For what?" Carol asked.

"For, you know, letting us get started first before you and Tyreese did anything. If Daryl's already in the mood he can overlook it, but when y'all are doing something first it pretty much shuts down anything that I was trying to get started," Michonne said.

Carol smiled. "You know, I kind of had a suspicion it might. It doesn't bother me or Tyreese, so I usually try to hold off until I know if you two are going to do anything. It would be easier if you let me know ahead of time, so I'd know if we needed to wait or not."

"Oh, wouldn't that be great?" Michonne said, snickering. "We just develop our own little system and I let you know when I'm in the mood to initiate something or to allow it to continue if Daryl initiates it?"

Carol shrugged. "I mean, why not? It's not like there are any big secrets in that house anyway. That way your plans wouldn't get interrupted and we wouldn't be waiting around, listening at the walls to see if anything was going on."

"You listen?" Michonne asked.

Carol was quiet for a minute, and then she giggled. "Yeah, I actually do, now that I've had to think about whether or not we make Daryl nervous. I mean I stop listening once something starts up, because then we've got the green light if we want it, but I do kind of listen to see if you're working up to something."

Michonne clucked at Carol as though she disapproved, but Carol could tell that she really didn't care and was just teasing her. She doubted, at this point, that Michonne would be deterred if they were all in the same room together.

Once upon a time it would have bothered Carol, but she realized more and more that the concept of privacy they'd once had just didn't seem to exist anymore. There wasn't room for that in this life now. Privacy, modesty, secrets, those things just didn't exist. Now everything and everyone was bared for everyone else to see, and it really didn't matter. Carol was slowly realizing that it didn't even make her uncomfortable anymore, and she wondered if eventually it wouldn't make Daryl uncomfortable anymore.

"Daryl asked me if I thought you might move in with Tyreese," Michonne said after a minute.

"And what did you tell him?" Carol asked.

"Honestly I told him that I didn't know," Michonne said.

Carol thought about it for a minute.

"If it's alright with y'all, I'd think for now I'd rather stay in the house," Carol said.

"It's fine with us," Michonne said. She had suspected as much, and she could admit to herself that she was pleased with Carol's answer. She didn't mind that Tyreese stayed over some nights, and she really wouldn't have minded if he'd wanted to move in there, but she couldn't imagine living in the house and knowing that Carol wasn't across the hall or that Judith wasn't sharing the nursery with Hope. It was almost a source of comfort knowing that in the morning she would see Carol getting Judith ready, and at night they would say goodnight before heading off to their respective rooms.

"Michonne," Carol started after a few minutes, "are you and Daryl still thinking about having another baby?"

"We haven't really talked about it much." Michonne said.

"Well, you don't have too much longer before you need to make a decision," Carol said, "you might want to talk about it so you can let me know."

"I'll talk to him," Michonne said.

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"We're going to have to find more gas cans," Glenn said, walking back toward the community with Maggie, carrying the latest one that he'd filled. "Either that or use some."

"I'm sure we'll be making some runs soon. We could offer to start looking into some of the other towns," Maggie said. "Then we could refuel."

"As much of a shortage as we've had," Glenn responded, "it's strange to think that now we've got more gas than we've got places to put it."

"It's kind of exciting," Maggie said. "Carol's wanting us to start cleaning out another house for storage so we can go on runs and get whatever we can before anyone else gets to it. I'm anxious to get as much as possible. Every time I go in the storage house I get excited."

"Why? It's just a house packed full of stuff," Glenn said.

"It's not the stuff as much as what the stuff means," Maggie offered. "It means we're staying. It means we don't have as much to worry about. I guess I just feel safe whenever I go in there."

"I do like the idea of staying," Glenn said.

Glenn had never liked the drifting part of their lifestyle. Drifting was dangerous, it was so unpredictable. Their lives now _could_ be unpredictable, but it wasn't like when you had to sleep with one eye open to make sure you weren't surprised in the middle of the night.

"Maggie, do you ever think about those men?" Glenn asked.

"What men?" Maggie asked.

"The drifters, the ones we killed," Glenn responded.

"Not really," Maggie said.

"Do you think they were bad guys before all of this happened, or do you think it's the lifestyle? Would the lifestyle do the same to us?" Glenn questioned.

"What do you mean would it do the same to us?" Maggie asked.

"I mean, do you think that us living the way we live makes us act and think a certain way, but if we were just constantly drifting we'd be different?" Glenn said.

Maggie thought about it a while. The lifestyle they led did have a lot of effects on them. She'd only experienced the strain and stress of "moving on" twice since this whole thing happened, but she knew that when they were moving, she was tense and more on guard. Everything seemed so much more fragile then, so much more like something could happen or even that it would happen. It felt like she was holding her breath almost the entire time. Living on the farm, living in the prison, and living in the community, there had been plenty of times when she wasn't holding her breath, at least not as much as when they were on the move.

"I think the lifestyle does affect you, and it does change you a little bit, but those men didn't become that way just because of the lifestyle," she said finally.

"So you don't think we'd be different if we stayed on the move?" Glenn asked.

"We'd be _different_, I'm sure, but we wouldn't be like them. I don't think we could help being different, but I don't think it would turn us into rapists and murderers," Maggie said.

Glenn thought about it.

"Maggie," he said softly, "we _are_ murderers."

"We only kill bad people," Maggie countered.

Glenn didn't know if that justified it or not, he wasn't sure how he felt about it. "Does that make it any different?" He asked.

"I think it does," Maggie said. "I guess we're sort of the Robin Hoods of murderers. The only people we've killed wouldn't have done anything but bring harm to others, so we were just taking out the trash."

Glenn thought about it a minute. "I guess maybe you're right."


	53. Chapter 53

AN: So here we go, a shorter-ish chapter. I may have another out tonight, but I will likely not finish it until tomorrow. I had plenty of time yesterday (about 10 hours in the car) which I dedicated to daydreaming about the story (mixed in with bouts of singing to the radio) and now I'm many miles ahead into the story and loving it more and more.

Thank you to all of you who have reviewed and continue to review. I'm glad to see that some of you are so enthusiastic. In response to one of them, I too have grown to really love the character of Carol, through writing the story, and I'm wondering how it's going to affect me when I start watching the show again since for me she was always just a character that was just _there_, never really disliked, but never really liked all that much.

Anyway, I hope you enjoy.

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"Do you think you think you can build a smokehouse?" Daryl asked Tyreese while they were stacking some of the wood up in the shed that he'd built for Carol.

"I'm sure I could," Tyreese said. "I guess given enough time to think about it I could build just about anything."

"Well start thinkin' 'bout it," Daryl said. "I wanna start huntin' soon as it starts warmin' up an' the animals start ramblin' about. If'n we can smoke meat then we can put it away and it'll last longer. We'll just need to dry it real good too."

"We'll figure it out," Tyreese said. The thought of meat was very appealing. Their canned options for meat had been limited and thought Daryl had tried, the cold weather had meant that hunting had provided them with very little. If they could store it, though, like they planned to store the vegetables and fruits they hoped to grow, there could be a lot more in their futures.

"You did real good buildin' this shed," Daryl said.

"Well, I did a little carpentry as a side job back before all this happened. My dad worked some in construction and some with carpentry, so I guess I picked it up along the way with helping him out," Tyreese responded.

"Yeah, I worked some construction jobs here an' there," Daryl said, "but I weren't never real good at it, I just did it to pay some bills sometimes, you know?"

Tyreese nodded.

"Well, I'm sure we'll figure out how to build something that will work to get us some meat to put in storage, do you think Carol knows much about drying it?" Tyreese asked. He worried sometimes that they demanded a little too much of Carol. Daryl was quick to drop projects in her laps, but she did whatever he asked, pretty much without question. Tyreese suspected that sometimes she really wasn't positive _how_ to do everything she agreed to do, but like with most things they all did around there, she just muddled her way through until she figured it out.

"I don't know if she knows how to do it or not, but it can't be that hard," Daryl said. He grinned at Tyreese, "I know why you built this here shed, you did so as Carol would thank you so she ain't got to try to build no fires with wet wood no more."

Tyreese smiled. "I guess the thank you is part of the pay off. The other part is getting a hot breakfast even when we've had a damp night the night before."

Daryl nodded, still smiling. "I reckon the breakfast had somethin' to do with it, but I think you like Carol alright, too."

Tyreese nodded again. "You're right Daryl, I like her alright," he said.

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"I'm serious, Daryl, we have to talk," Michonne said, though she was sure that her inability not to laugh at this moment did not display the gravity that she was hoping to display. She was not in a serious mood herself, owing to the absolutely ridiculous evening that they'd had.

Per Carol's recommendations, they'd decided to have a game night and Daryl and Tyreese had wickedly agreed upon Twister when they were sent to Maggie and Glenn's to choose a game for them. The game had taught all four of them that they were not as young as they used to be physically, and that they all lacked a little something in the way of flexibility and balance that they didn't really know about. It had also taught them, though, that all of them could be given to fits of laughter when placed in the right position and scenario.

Now, however, the game was through and Michonne and Daryl had retired upstairs, intending to talk on Michonne's end, but it was clear to her that Daryl had other intentions. At this moment, however, she had the bed between them.

"Do we gotta talk _right now_, 'Chonne? Can't we do it later?" Daryl asked. He started around the bed and she laughed at him, trying to plan her escape route.

"We need to talk, Daryl, and we haven't had much time to talk lately. We've been so busy trying to get everything ready for spring and you're always so tired, that _yes_, we do need to talk _now_." Michonne said. Although she really didn't want to talk, and had to admit that she was much more in the mood for the fun that Daryl had in mind, she also knew that it had been nearly impossible to get any time to talk to him lately, and that a relaxed Daryl was the best kind to talk to in order to have any kind of conversation that wasn't going to leave her wanting to beat her head, or his, on the wall.

"I know we ain't had much time together lately, and that's why I don't want to spend it talkin' right now, 'Chonne!" Daryl said.

Michonne knew he was about to make a jump for her, and she was prepared to try to get across the bed to the other side as quickly as possible.

"But if we do what you're proposing first then you'll want to go to sleep and then we won't get to talk and I don't want to wait anymore," she protested, trying not to laugh at him again.

"I got an idea," Daryl said.

"What's that?" Michonne asked.

"How about we do fun first, and then we do talkin', and I'll stay awake 'cause I ain't sleepy and we could do fun again when we're done talkin'," he suggested.

"How do I know you're going to stay awake?" She asked.

"OK, then, if I catch you we do fun first," Daryl said, "but if you can avoid me, then we do your talkin' first."

"OK," Michonne said, "how long do I have to avoid you?"

"Until I catch you," Daryl responded, still grinning.

"That's not fair, Daryl, there's no way for me to win that," she said.

"Exactly," Daryl said.

Finally Daryl made his move and Michonne tried to get across the bed, but he grabbed her by the leg. She didn't fight him. She didn't really want to, and the action just renewed the laughter that she'd been enjoying all evening. Daryl crawled over her and pinned her to the bed, face down.

"You were too slow," he said, lying on top of her so as to pin her completely. He was laughing to now, so neither of them could do much more than lie there. "Admit it," he said, "you would rather have fun right now too."

"OK, Daryl, I admit it, but we have got to have a serious talk," Michonne said.

"'Chonne, it's been a good night," Daryl said. "We ain't done one serious thing tonight, why can't we just keep it that way? Can't whatever you got to talk about keep until mornin'?" He still made no move to get off of her.

Michonne sighed.

"We _never_ talk in the morning anymore, Daryl, you're always out the door to work until breakfast and then you disappear right after you eat," she said.

"So tomorrow I won't. Tomorrow we'll talk before breakfast, and we'll talk after breakfast if you think you still got talkin' to do," Daryl argued. "I won't do no work until you're satisfied that you've done all the talkin' that you want."

"Fine," Michonne said after a minute, "but I'm holding you to it."

Daryl had already stopped paying her any attention the fine had prompted him to start kissing the back of her neck, and though he didn't let up on her any, she could feel him snaking his hand up under her, sliding it in her shirt.

"Daryl," she said after a minute.

"What?" He asked.

"You really have to let up on me a little, you're smothering me," she said.

Daryl lifted up enough for her to crawl up onto her knees. She started to roll over and he stopped her.

"No, stay," Daryl commanded.

She snickered at him. "So that's how this is going down?"

Daryl responded by reaching around her and fumbling with the buttons on her pants, tickling her in the process.

"Fine, Daryl, I'll stay, but at least let me help you out," she said.

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Michonne half expected Daryl to be gone when she woke up the next morning, having probably forgotten all about his promise to talk with her. She was surprised, however, to find him sitting on the bed next to her, watching her when she finally opened her eyes.

"Good mornin', beautiful," Daryl said, grinning.

Michonne smiled at him. "Good morning, handsome," she responded.

"Did'ja sleep good?" Daryl asked.

"Mmmhmmm," Michonne moaned, stretching. "I didn't think you'd be here," she said.

"I told ya I would, didn't I?" Daryl said.

"Hope hasn't woke up yet?" Michonne asked.

"Nope, still asleep. I went in there earlier to check on her, but she was sleepin' good, just like you. I think I'm the only one awake in the house," Daryl said. "So," he started after a minute, "you 'wake enough for talkin'?"

Michonne wasn't entirely in the mood to talk at this moment, but she knew that now was as good a time as any and that they weren't necessarily going to have too many more opportunities like this.

"Daryl," she started, "we have to make a decision about whether or not we're going to try to have another baby," she finished.

Daryl bit at his thumb. "I thought we done decided we was," he said.

"I know we said we were going to, but I don't know…" Michonne said.

"What's changed, 'Chonne? You said you was OK with another one, so what's got you sayin' you ain't now?" Daryl asked.

"I'm not saying that I'm entirely against it, but I want to make sure that we've really discussed this," Michonne said. "When Dora and Frank died, we could have lost Hope."

"Yeah, we could have, but we got lucky," Daryl said.

Michonne nodded. "But if we hadn't gotten lucky, Daryl, we would have lost her. I know what that feels like, you don't."

"I can imagine it wouldn't feel real good, 'Chonne," Daryl said. "I don't wanna lose Hope, and I wouldn't want to lose another baby if we had another one. I don't see how that's gonna change at all."

"It just means we have twice as much to lose, and twice the possibility of losing it, I guess," Michonne said.

Michonne had been over and over details with Daryl. He thought he understood them all. She'd already made it clear to him that they were only going to have two kids at most, and he was fine with that. He'd settled into the idea of having two kids. At least Hope would have a sibling, someone else out there around her age. Daryl didn't know how many babies there were in the world right now, but at least three of them was a good number if they did get to grow up. Daryl also understood that Michonne had pointed out all the ways to him that something could go wrong, ways that they could lose their children, and Daryl understood that. He wasn't under any illusion that they were guaranteed to make it, but he was hopeful that there was some possibility that they would.

"'Chonne," Daryl started, "I know you don't like to talk about it, but if you had the chance, knowing what you know now, would you go back and erase your little girls?" Daryl asked.

Michonne looked at him. She already knew what he was getting at.

"No, Daryl, I wouldn't," she said. She hated losing her girls, but she had dearly loved them and

"And _if_ somethin' happened and we lost Hope, would you be sorry we had her?" Daryl asked.

Michonne half smiled at him. "No, Daryl, I wouldn't."

"So, 'Chonne, ain't nothin' promised to us no more, and I ain't sayin' we even gonna see tomorrow, but if we do, and if Jude and Hope make it, I don't want us to be lookin' back wishin' that we'd had another and we didn't 'cause we was too busy worryin' 'bout what we couldn't change no way," Daryl said.

Michonne sighed. Daryl wanted another baby, and she'd actually let herself become used to the idea, even though on the one hand it went against her better judgment.

"Ok, Daryl, I tell you what, I'll keep it in mind, but I want to talk to Carol about it, and when it's closer to time I want us to talk to the whole group before we make any final decisions," she said.

"Why we gotta talk to everyone? It ain't their business if we want to have another baby," he said, wrinkling his forehead.

"Yes it is, Daryl. Nothing around here is a private decision anymore. If something happens to us, the group is going to end up with Hope and the baby, so I think we should at least discuss it with them before we decide to actually let this happen," Michonne reasoned.

Daryl finally agreed.

"Can we go wake Carol up now an' get some breakfast?" Daryl asked when they'd finished their conversation.

"Fine, Daryl," Michonne said, "Hope needs to get up anyway, I don't want her sleeping too much today and then keeping me up all night."

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"Look, I know you've talked about it, and I know you've thought about it, so I'm fine with it," Carol said. Michonne was following her around and helping her with ration boxes to allow them some time to talk. "I think we're safe for a while, or at least as safe as we can be these days. I'll support you through one more, but that's it."

"No, that's all that's on the table. I've already let Daryl know that one is all I'm willing to do," Michonne said.

Carol stopped what she was doing and smiled at Michonne.

"Then we're going to do this?" She asked.

"It looks like we are," Michonne said.

"Fine, I'll get Glenn and Maggie to do a run soon and get me some books. I've got to read up on farming anyway, so I might as well read up on this while I'm at it," Carol said.

"Carol," Michonne said, "can you do me a favor?"

"What's that?" Carol asked, resuming her actions.

"Can you let me know a few days before we have to make a final decision? I'd like to have a talk with the whole group, you know, allow everyone to give their opinions before we just decide that we're adding another child into the mix," Michonne said.

"I'll be happy to, and I think that's a good idea. At least it will make the group feel like they were involved in this, and not like it's just something that happened to everyone," Carol said. She laughed after a minute.

"What?" Michonne asked.

"I was just thinking that we're probably the only two women left in the world right now that are having a discussion about planning for a baby," Carol said.

"You're probably right, Carol," Michonne said. "You're probably right."


	54. Chapter 54

AN: Not a heavy Michonne/Daryl chapter, but that happens from time to time…no worries, they have lots of time together in the future.

Sorry to those of you who are only in it for them, you'll just have to deal with this chapter and know that your favorite love birds are still safe and sound and very much the darling couple you've come to expect them to be.

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"I'm telling you," Glenn said, following Maggie through the bookstore with Sasha close behind him, "she's pregnant."

"How do you know that, Glenn?" Maggie asked, stopping at a shelf and pulling several of the books in front of her into a bag. She was the one filling the bags, Sasha and Glenn were more or less just following her around, carrying things and killing the few Walkers that they'd encountered inside the store. Apparently at the end of the world bookstores weren't picked over because they'd found the place pretty much untouched.

"You've got the list, you tell me she's not," Glenn said. "She was all secretive about it too, so she doesn't want to talk about it."

"Well, if she is, maybe she doesn't want anyone to know yet," Maggie said. "What's a doula?"

"I don't know," Glenn said, "but she said it would be wherever the rest of the _baby_ books were."

"Yeah, but we're getting all kinds of medical books," Maggie said, "unless she said she was pregnant, then we don't know if she actually is or if she's just reading up on everything she can think of right now."

"Yeah, but she stressed _farm_ books and _baby_ books. The rest she just added later as "whatever you can find'," Glenn continued. "We know why the farm books are pretty urgent to her, and there's only one real possible explanation as to why baby books are urgent right now."

"Well, Tyreese hasn't said anything," Sasha said. She'd just been listening to the two of them discuss it since Glenn had brought it up in the truck on the way over.

"Maybe he doesn't know yet," Glenn said, "maybe she's waiting to tell him too."

Maggie thought about it for a few minutes. The thought of imagining Carol pregnant was one that she couldn't really wrap her mind around. Carol was the birth control _pusher_ around the community. It just didn't seem likely to Maggie that Carol would let herself slip through the cracks.

"Well, I just don't think we ought to go jumping to conclusions until she says something else about it," Maggie said. "If she is and she hasn't said anything, then she's got her reasons to keep it to herself, and I don't think she'd appreciate you blabbing it all over the place. If I can keep it quiet, you can keep it quiet."

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It was almost lunchtime when the truck return from the run. It had been a short run set up by Carol so that she could make plans for what they would need for future runs to bring their gardening plans into action as soon as it was time to begin planting.

Junior had luckily grown up on a farm, so Carol was counting on him for some assistance, but she felt like she needed more information before she'd be able feel confident about the decisions that she was going to have to make about their future food supply. She'd also requested books about canning and storing food, as well as books about birth, midwives, doulas, and anything else they could find regarding pregnancy and birth, in case Daryl and Michonne decided to go through with their plan.

She had informed Daryl at breakfast that she was sending Glenn, Maggie, and Sasha on the run and then she had pulled Glenn to the side, providing him with a list as well as explaining to him what she wanted. He hadn't said anything, simply nodding his understanding and collecting his crew.

Carol left the food cooking and followed the truck to where Glenn parked it. All three of them spilled out, and Glenn got two full bags of books out of the back.

"Did you get everything?" Carol asked.

"We got all that we could," Glenn said. Maggie and Sasha had headed off in the opposite direction without saying anything.

Carol reached to take the bags from him.

"Thank you," she said.

Glenn pulled the bags away from her. "I've got it," he said, "I'll carry them. They're pretty heavy. Where do you want me to put them for you?"

"Oh," Carol said, "um, just put them in our living room, I guess. I need to sort through them anyway."

"No problem," Glenn said, heading toward their house with the two bags of books draped over his shoulders.

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For the amount of work they were doing, and for the type of work it was, the group was remarkably jovial. Jimmy had led everyone working on busting up the street in a riveting round of "I've Been Working on the Railroad" that had turned into a round that they kept repeating over and over. Michonne had been alternating every little while between hoeing and destruction, and she knew that the hoeing crew was also having their fun, though "Old McDonald Had a Farm" was the song that Rachel had apparently recommended.

When they broke for lunch, everyone brought their laughter and levity with them. The group approached, half suspecting the lunch break, and then later hearing Carol's bell the closer they got. Carol smiled at them all, and walked back over to one of the fires she had going, the one she was using for cooking, the other was heating the water she needed for the laundry she'd start after everyone was fed and back to work.

Michonne approached Carol first.

"Where's Hope?" Michonne asked. "I think I'm going to let her eat first."

Carol wrapped a rag around the handle of one of the pots. "Inside with Beth, but before you feed her, could you pump some for cereal?"

"Sure, I don't mind," Michonne said.

Carol heaved up one of the pots and started after Michonne, in the direction of the kitchen. When she put it down, she turned around, surprised to find that Glenn was bringing in the other. She gave him a puzzled look.

"I just thought I'd bring it in as I was coming," Glenn said, half smiling. "Those pots are heavy, you shouldn't have to be lugging them around all day." He put it down next to the first one, glanced a moment at Michonne who was not even attempting to hide what she was doing, and slipped back out the kitchen and toward the dining room.

"He's such a funny kid, sometimes," Carol said, smiling.

"That he is," Michonne said.

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Glenn watched Carol and he watched Tyreese. If Carol _was_ pregnant, she didn't look pregnant, at least not yet. Still, it had taken a while for Lori to look pregnant, and it had taken a while for Michonne to look pregnant, so he didn't suspect that Carol would be any different. Tyreese didn't know yet. It was pretty obvious. He _couldn't_ know, because he wasn't acting right if he did know.

Carol and Tyreese were their own kind of couple. If you hadn't known they were together, you probably wouldn't have suspected it. You would have thought they were good friends, but little else. Tyreese did things for Carol, and they smiled at each other a lot, but that was about it. Every now and again, if you timed it just right, you would catch a quick kiss between them, or a moment when Carol would catch his hand or he'd touch her shoulder, but they weren't very affectionate. Glenn wouldn't be positive that they were in a relationship at all if Maggie hadn't told him about catching them in the kitchen once, or if he himself hadn't seen them leaving Carol's house, early in the morning, snuggled together until Tyreese walked Carol down to headquarters to get breakfast going.

Now Carol might be pregnant. Glenn hadn't thought about it until today, but Carol was _always_ carrying something, and it was usually something heavy. You could catch her hauling wood, hauling pots around, hauling buckets around, or hauling boxes around, but she almost _always_ had her hands full. Even when she wasn't hauling things around, she was handing out plates of food or carrying around piles of dishes. Glenn just didn't think that Tyreese would let her keep doing all of that if he knew.

It really wasn't fair of Carol to keep it to herself, he thought. He'd be hurt if Maggie was pregnant and didn't tell him. He'd want to take care of her, and he was pretty sure that Tyreese would feel the same. He could see how she might not want the entire group to know right away, but she should at least tell him.

Glenn was frustrated. He wasn't sure what he should do, but he felt like he should do something.

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Tyreese had asked Carol what she knew about smoking and drying meat and she'd admitted that she knew very little about it. He had a small amount of knowledge. His grandfather had a couple of smokehouses and he'd spent a few summers with him when he was younger, but what he remembered was pretty limited. Carol had told him the night before that she was sending Glenn and Maggie on a book run, and that she would try to find out all she could. She'd specially requested some books on smoking and drying meat.

Now he was trying to figure out how he wanted to frame the smokehouse, and what would be the best way to go about this. He could remember the structures on his grandfather's farm, the ones that his father and grandfather had built together, but the memory was one clouded by time.

Glenn was sort of awkwardly hanging around him, so he finally got his attention.

"Glenn, come here," he called out to the kid.

"You need something?" Glenn asked.

"Those books you got today, did you find anything about smoking and drying meat?" Tyreese asked. He was hoping for some illustrations or some insight into his construction before he got to work actually trying to make it happen.

Glenn scratched his head a little. "We got something about everything that Carol was worried about, but I don't know exactly what all we got. Maggie got most of the books," Glenn said.

"Where are the books?" Tyreese asked.

"I'll show you. I put them in the living room for Carol to go through," Glenn said. Tyreese followed him back to Carol's house where there were two large sacks packed full of books.

"There's a lot of stuff here," Glenn said. He was a little nervous now. When they went through the sacks they'd see all the books they got on babies and on birth. Tyreese was sure to figure out what was going on. On the one hand, Glenn was relieved that he wasn't going to be involved in letting Tyreese know what was going on, but on the other he wasn't entirely sure he wanted to be part of Tyreese figuring it out. "We got all the stuff she wanted to read about."

Tyreese started digging through the bags, sorting the books into piles as he went. There were books on canning. Carol had told him that she knew _how_ to can, and had done it many times, but wanted to refresh her memory. There were books on farming, and Tyreese knew that she was worried about the upcoming task ahead of them of planting. Junior had a little insight into farming, as did Maggie, but Carol was worried that should they plant the wrong things, or plant them at the wrong time or in the wrong manner, people would blame her for the failed harvest. There were lots of medical guides about home remedies and basic medical diagnosis and first aid. Carol had become, somehow, their doctor, though she had admitted to him that all she knew about medicine before this whole thing started had involved Neosporin and Band-Aids. He continued digging through the bags, the various piles growing. There was one guide on smoking meat, but he continued on to see what the other bag held.

There were a good number of books in the second bag on birth, on midwives, on pregnancy. Tyreese piled them up, curious. Everyone in the community was on birth control, he knew that, so he wasn't sure why there were so many of them. While he was stacking these, it was obvious that Glenn was nervous.

"So are you going to tell me why you're nervous?" Tyreese asked him finally.

"What?" Glenn asked. He tried to act calm, but even he realized that his voice had changed a little.

"I spend most of my time around Daryl and Michonne," Tyreese started, "I've picked up pretty good on how to read people."

"I'm not nervous, I mean, not really. There's a lot of stuff there, did you find what you wanted?" Glenn asked.

"Not yet, at least not exactly, and yes there's a lot of stuff here, but Carol has a lot of stuff on her plate. I don't think everyone realizes how much Carol has to think about," Tyreese said.

"So you knew, already?" Glenn asked. Tyreese didn't seem troubled by all the books that he was piling up, so maybe Glenn had read it wrong. Maybe he _did_ know and just didn't think it mattered all that much.

"Knew what?" Tyreese asked, half interested. He was starting to hit the part of the bag that most interested him, and was thumbing through a book to see if there were any illustrations.

"About the baby?" Glenn asked.

Tyreese stopped thumbing through the book and Glenn wished he hadn't said anything. Tyreese didn't say anything, but he was still for a minute, and then he went back to flipping through books, not saying anything. Glenn wasn't really sure what to do. He wasn't sure now whether Tyreese knew or not, but it was clear that he wasn't going to respond. He just sat there thumbing through books until he found something that apparently was what he wanted. He got up and started out the house. Glenn followed him.

"I can help you," Glenn said, following him back to the place they'd been before where Tyreese had been trying to figure out how to frame a smoke house. Tyreese handed Glenn the book.

"Read through the structure part of this," Tyreese said, handing the book roughly to Glenn. "I'll be back in a few minutes."

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"Hey," Tyreese called as he came upon Carol, scrubbing clothes, "you got something you need to tell me about?"

"What?" Carol asked.

"I asked if you need to tell me about something. I don't get how you can talk to Glenn and not bother to talk to me about things first!" Tyreese said. He didn't realize the frustration in his voice and stance until he noticed Carol backing away from him, drawing up a little in the process. She was sitting down and didn't have far to go. As soon as he saw it, he tried to calm himself. "Don't back away from me," Tyreese said, softening his voice and trying to soften his face.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Carol said, her voice trembling a little.

Tyreese reached a hand out to her, meaning to pull her to her feet and she flinched a little. He bent down and took her arm, pulling gently on it and letting his hand slide down it until he got to her hand.

"Come here," he said.

Carol slowly got up, letting him help her.

"Carol, are you pregnant?" Tyreese asked. "I won't be mad if you are, but you should at least have told me about it before you…" Tyreese couldn't finish because Carol interrupted him.

"No, no, of _course_ not!" She said. "Where would you get such an idea?"

"Glenn…" Tyreese said.

Carol looked confused for a moment and then her face softened into a smile. She reached her hand up to Tyreese's neck and pulled him to her. He kissed her, her lips soft on his.

"I'm not pregnant," she said, pulling away finally. "I wouldn't want to be, not that it has anything to do with you, but I just wouldn't want to try to do that. I mean, I had some problems, and things could be different now, but…"

This time Tyreese interrupted her by kissing her again, this time more deeply than her own kiss had been. When they pulled apart, Tyreese felt the need to explain.

"I went through the books that they got for you today. I wanted to see if I could find some information on that smoke house before I tried to build it," he explained.

Carol understood completely. Glenn had drawn his own conclusions from the books that she'd requested.

"The books aren't for me," Carol said, "or not exactly. Michonne and Daryl are talking about maybe having a second baby. I just wanted the chance to read about it in case they decide to go through with it. I don't really know what I'm doing, and I wanted to know more before I'm supposed to be the one with all the answers."

Tyreese kissed Carol again. He smiled at her. He looked relieved.

"I wouldn't be mad if you were pregnant, but I have to admit that I'm glad you're not," he said.

"I'm glad I'm not too, believe me!" Carol said.

"Promise me that if you were, you would tell me," Tyreese said.

"I promise. I'd tell you as soon as I knew," she said. He hugged her to him, rubbing her back for a minute.

"I had better go set Glenn straight, before anyone else gets the wrong idea," Tyreese said.


	55. Chapter 55

Daryl felt Michonne shiver. He wrapped his leg around her, and pulled her in closer to him. As tight as he could get them.

Michonne felt him pull her in, roughly, but she appreciated the action. He was as tightly wrapped around her as he could, his arms and hands as tightly pressed into her skin as they could be. Even though he shaved from time to time, his whiskers were growing back and they scratched the back of her neck as he nuzzled into her.

Daryl was a nuzzler. Michonne had never thought that she would find beard burn on the back of her neck so comforting, so soothing.

Michonne sighed a heavy sigh.

"What'cha thinkin'?" Daryl asked, sleepily.

Michonne hadn't realized he was fully awake. If it had been any other man, anyone she'd known before, she wouldn't have responded with anything besides "nothing", but this was Daryl, and you could say whatever you wanted to say to him.

"I was just thinking about how much I love you," she said.

Daryl smiled, not sure if she knew it or not.

"I love you too, 'Chonne," he said. He was always disappointed when he said those words. He did love her, but the problem was that he still didn't feel they were appropriate. They weren't really what he felt when he touched her. When he touched her, when he smelled her, when he tasted her, it wasn't just "I love you" that he felt, it was something different. He _lived_ her. He breathed her. She was everything he'd ever wanted, everything he'd ever needed, and he hadn't even known it until she'd allowed him to hold her in his arms. How could he put that into words? "'Chonne," he started after a minute, "how long you reckon we been together?"

"I don't know, Daryl," Michonne admitted. "At least a year, but I don't know how long exactly."

_A year?_ Daryl thought about it. Had it only been a year? He couldn't believe that. Michonne must be mistaken. It had been much longer than that. When he thought back in his mind about his life he'd never really felt happy until he'd become Michonne's, and he couldn't believe that all the happiness he felt spanned only a year.

Michonne thought about it. She wasn't sure how long she'd been with Daryl. With the way that things went these days, a year seemed like an eternity, but it really didn't seem that long for the life they'd known before. Maybe it had been longer than that. She wasn't sure.

She thought for a moment about life before all of this and the men that she'd known before. There had been a point, after a while, where they'd just lost interest. There wasn't really much of an explanation, it just seemed like there was a point where they were no longer interested in you. You'd become dull, old news. Daryl had never felt like that kind of man, but admitting out loud that she didn't know how long they'd been together made her a little uncomfortable. She hated to admit to herself that she was wondering, even for a moment, if he _might_ turn into that kind of man.

"What's wrong?" Daryl asked. He felt Michonne tense. He didn't think he'd hurt her, but then sometimes he accidentally caught her hair or scratched her when he never meant to.

"Nothing." Michonne mumbled. Daryl didn't think it had felt like nothing.

"What's wrong, 'Chonne?" He urged.

"Nothing, Daryl, I was just thinking about life before all of this," Michonne said.

"What about it?" He asked.

"I was thinking about people, Daryl, and about how sometimes men get to a point after a while where they are just done with you, where they want something new," Michonne said. Her husband had cheated on her. Her second baby was barely crawling before she'd found him in her bed with another woman.

"You want somethin' new?" Daryl asked, leaning up on his arm, a catch in his voice.

"No, Daryl, I don't want anything new," she said. "My husband…my _first_ husband, wanted something new."

Daryl squeezed her tighter to him, almost cutting off her breath.

"Please, 'Chonne, don't want nothin' new 'cause I don't never want nothin' new," he said.

Michonne smiled to herself a little. He was still thinking that the concern that she had was that _she_ would want something new eventually. He had no idea that this insecurity was her own about him. Poor Daryl…he hadn't realized yet that she too was capable of insecurity.

"I'm not going to ever want anything new, Daryl," Michonne said, "I just hope you don't decide that you want something new later."

"'Chonne, I ain't never had nothin', I certainly don't care if what I got is new or not," Daryl said.

And there it was. That was the kind of guarantee that you could get from Daryl. The most sincere that he had to offer. Michonne didn't take it as any kind of insult. It was the purest kind of promise that she could get. Daryl was hers, and she was his. As long as they lived, whether it was two days or twenty years, that was simply the way that things were going to be.

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"You've got three days," Carol said to Michonne after breakfast. "You need to do whatever you need to do to let me know if you want to go through with this or not."

"Fine, I'll tell Daryl that we need to call a meeting after dinner," Michonne said.

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Daryl was tense. He didn't know what bringing this up to the group would be like. They could react in a number of ways.

"So, we're not saying it's the best idea anyone ever had, or that it's without flaws, but we thought we'd present it to everyone," Michonne said, finally. She'd presented all the thoughts she had on the matter. All the pros and cons that she'd mapped out. Things she recognized could go wrong, and things that could go well, in an ideal universe. She felt like this had been the first time she'd put her law degree to complete use since all this happened. Everyone looked at her a little absently before anyone moved to start offering their thoughts.

"Well, you haven't had problems having kids before, and I haven't felt like Hope was exactly that much of a stress to everyone," Rachel said. "There was that situation with Hershel, though."

"That wasn't Hope's fault, entirely," Carol said, feeling the need to intervene. "Being overcome by a herd can happen, and it didn't help that none of us were armed. That had to do with being too comfortable more than anything." She glanced at Maggie and Beth, wondering how they'd react to the discussion.

"If we had to go on the road while I was feeding, I'd ride in a car," Michonne offered. "I do recognize that it was wrong to do otherwise now, and I'm deeply sorry for that." She cast a glance at Maggie, and then at Beth, but neither looked at her with accusation.

"I guess it doesn't really matter what we think about it," Glenn said, "if you want to have a baby, that's your business."

"No, it's not," Michonne said. "If I don't make it through the birth…" she paused a second, feeling Daryl squeeze her thigh, _that_ was a possibility that she was aware of but he was strongly trying to ignore, "then someone is going to have to help Daryl. If something happens along the way and Daryl and I don't make it, then the children will need someone to take care of them, and that means two instead of just Hope," she offered.

"Carol will take care of them," Maggie offered.

"I may not always be here," Carol said softly. "Clearly, I'd take care of them as long as I could, but I may not always be here."

Some of the group looked struck, Maggie included. The idea of losing them all had been something that she clearly had never thought of. There was a moment of silence.

"Well, I don't intend to have any children," Maggie said, "so Glenn and I would take care the children if something happened."

After a moment Glenn intervened. "Maggie, I hate to be negative, but what universe are you in where Michonne, Daryl, and Carol don't make it, but we're still here to take care of the kids?"

Glenn looked deflated at the moment.

"It could happen, Glenn," Michonne said. "There are a lot of things that could happen. Maggie, we're happy to know that you're with us and willing to offer your services."

"If we were here, I'd help," Stella offered. Dominique nodded.

Many of the people didn't have much to say, but they did nod some sign that they were fine with the plan.

Michonne drew a breath, and put her hand on Daryl's leg.

"What about you, Rick?" she asked after a second. He'd been silent the entire time.

Rick was quiet for a minute.

"Am I going to say it's the best idea we've had so far? No, I'm not going to say that. I don't think it's a great idea to bring more lives into this, this world is too unpredictable and we don't even have a doctor. I will say, though, that if you decide to go through with the plan then I'm not going to stop you," Rick said. He looked at Daryl for a minute. "Daryl wants a family, and if you're willing to put yourself in this position to do it, then I'll support the two of you. We already have Hope, and we have Judith. If you want to try to add one more to the mix, and everyone else is on board, then I'll deal with it, but ultimately it's the two of you who have to decide if you're willing to take on all the risks."

Michonne let out the breath that she realized she was holding.

"Is anyone opposed, then, to the idea?" She asked.

"You could die," Carl said, suddenly, "you could die like my mom did."

Michonne's face softened.

"Carl, I know that's a risk. We're hoping, though, that since I haven't ever needed a caesarian section in the past, I won't need one now," Michonne said, trying to soften her tone. "I'm going to do everything in my power to keep that from happening, but I do know that _anything_ is a possibility. I just have to hope it doesn't happen."

Carl looked pensive for a minute. Michonne looked at Rick, but there wasn't anything more in his face than in anyone else's.

Carl didn't respond to her, though Michonne offered him a few minutes to speak up.

"Anyone? I want to make sure that you're all as with us as you can be," Michonne said again. Daryl was silent beside her, as she had requested.

No one protested, all of them shaking their heads, some with more conviction than others.

Michonne took a deep breath.

"Thank you," she said. "Then I guess we'll be trying this in the next few months."

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Carol was out of sorts. Tyreese could tell that much. She'd responded to him, but it had all been halfhearted, and he knew she wasn't really with him.

"Where are you?" He asked after a while.

"What?" She asked in the darkness.

"Where are you?" He repeated. "You're not with me, so where are you?"

"Nowhere," she said, "I'm just here."

"No you're not. What are you thinking about?" He pressed.

"Everything." She responded. It was the most honest answer she could give. She was worried about so much. She felt responsible for so much, and yet she felt that all she was responsible for was out of her control.

"Talk to me," he said.

"I don't know what to say," Carol said, "I'm worried about the spring. If the harvest doesn't make after we plant, people are going to look at me. I'm worried about the baby, if I mess up, if something happens, I could lose my best friend, and Daryl would never forgive me, I'm just worried."

Tyreese hugged her.

"None of this is your problem," he said, "you can only do what you can do. You're just human, and no one is going to hold that against you. I won't let them."


	56. Chapter 56

"You need some help?" Rick called, walking up to Tyreese.

"Rick, I need all the help I can get," He said, slapping a hand on Rick's shoulder.

"I have to warn you, I'm not a master at construction," Rick said, "but I'll give it what I got."

"I'm an equal opportunity employer," Tyreese said, "all levels get positions."

Rick snickered at him.

Tyreese showed Rick the rough sketches he'd drawn up the night before.

"This is what I've got in mind," Tyreese said. He frowned a little at the drawings. "Well, at least this is roughly what I have in mind."

Rick looked at it.

"I started framing all three of them up," Tyreese said, pointing down the side of the street where he had framed what would be their future smokehouses. "I don't know much about this other than what one of these books I had told me, but I thought three was a good number. Daryl can do all the hunting and fishing that his heart desires and we'll be able to put it up. Apparently it should last almost indefinitely, so we'll have a meat source when the game isn't plentiful."

"OK," Rick said, "so where should I start?" He looked at Glenn who already seemed hard at work on one of the structures.

"Pick one for yourself, man," Tyreese said. "I'm going to tell the demolition crew to try to get us as much undamaged wood as they can from another house. I think I might send Glenn and Maggie on a run to see if they can get any wood from that hardware store. I know Carol wants them to go out looking for some seeds and other things that she needs."

"That sounds like a good idea. I'll get going with what we've got here," Rick said. Tyreese walked off to the other side of the community to give out some orders.

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"I don't know, Tyreese, that hardware store was pretty picked over," Maggie said, shielding her eyes from the sun with her hand.

"What about the stuff for Carol? He asked. "Do you think that you could get that in town?"

"I mean we can look," Maggie offered.

Daryl and Michonne, who had both been taking a "water" break, had joined Maggie and Tyreese in their discussion about a possible run.

"There's a feed and seed store in the next town," Michonne offered. "There's another hardware store there, too."

"We could do that," Maggie offered. "We were wanting to start runs over there anyway. We could take two vehicles and make a day of it, getting as much as we can. We could leave first thing tomorrow morning, after breakfast, and we'd have plenty of time."

"Sounds like a plan," Daryl said. "You and Glenn can take the delivery truck, and two others could take a car. You might even be able to steal another truck somewhere in town."

"I want to go," Michonne quickly said.

"Well if you're going, then I'll go too," Daryl said. "I ain't been on a run in a while and I'd like to go on one."

"Fine," Tyreese said, "I can hold down the fort while you're gone. I think everyone around here has plenty to do. Carol's got some work for everyone finishing with setting up that second storage house, and between that, demo work here, and construction with me, there shouldn't be anyone needing you to direct them."

"It's settled then," Maggie said, "early breakfast and we'll go out for as much as we can get."

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"So you just gettin' cabin fever or somethin'?" Daryl asked Michonne the next morning as they were driving down the road. Maggie and Glenn were behind them in the truck and Michonne was telling Daryl how to get to the town.

"What do you mean?" Michonne asked.

"I mean you wantin' to come on this run," Daryl said. "You just seemed like you _really _wanted to come. You gettin' tired of bein' holed up in the community?"

"Not really," Michonne said. "There's enough room there to keep you from getting too suffocated by it."

"Well, that's good then, 'cause this may be your last run for a while. You know you ain't goin' nowhere outside them gates when you get pregnant," Daryl said.

"Yeah, I know that, Daryl," Michonne said.

Carol had made Daryl agree to maximum lockdown for Michonne as soon as there was any indication that she was pregnant, to which he'd more than readily agreed. She'd also demanded that Michonne hand over all her free will, essentially, to her. She was to do no activity without first having Carol's permission to proceed. Michonne really didn't care much, she certainly intended to be as careful as she could, so she didn't mind the extra help in making sure that she accomplished that goal.

"So why was you itchin' to go on the run? Feelin' rusty?" He asked. Daryl knew that sometimes Michonne would go on water runs, or even stand guard for people hauling things in and out the gates, just so that she could kill Walkers. She seemed to feel that if she went too long without doing it she wouldn't be as good at doing it as she had been before.

"I have a stop I want to make while we're here," Michonne said. "I wanted to come myself so that I can be sure that I get what I want."

Michonne had fed Hope before she left, and had pumped as much milk as she could for Carol in case Hope got too fidgety before they got back. She ate some solids, but usually she demanded at least a little milk before considering trying anything else. They had yet to find a bottle that she actually liked, but Michonne was sure that Carol could convince her to eat enough to hold her off until they got back.

"What do you want to get?" Daryl asked.

"Just some personal things, Daryl," Michonne said. Daryl didn't say anything.

Daryl remembered that Michonne had lived here. She probably wanted things from her old life. Not many of them had anything left from their old lives. He knew that a few people still had pictures tucked away, and some carried around a souvenir or two of who they had been, so he wasn't surprised, now that he thought about it, that Michonne might leap at the chance to retrieve one or two items that held special meaning for her. When everything had happened, when it had all gone to hell, very few of them had thought to bring things with them that held sentimental value. Daryl hadn't ever had anything with any sentimental value, so he could say that he was perfectly fine with having left behind everything he left in that nasty ass tin can he'd called home.

When they got to the town, Michonne led them right to the center, but told Daryl to just keep the engine running. She got out the car and he watched as she cleared out the eight or so Walkers in the area that bothered to pay their vehicles any attention. Eight Walkers didn't mean much to _his_ woman, she didn't bat an eye at them before she killed them nonchalantly and walked over to Glenn's window of the truck.

"I've got some business to take care of," Michonne said, "so we're going to do that and we'll be right back. You two can get to work. The Feed and Seed is just over there, she pointed, and the hardware store is down that street." She pointed in the other direction.

"Fine, we'll get started," Glenn said.

Michonne got back in the car with Daryl and gave him instructions on how to get to her house, purposefully avoiding any street that would take her anywhere near her ex-husband's prior home.

Daryl stopped the car in front of the house that Michonne directed him to. They both got out and together took out the five Walkers ambling around in the street. Michonne mounted the familiar steps from the sidewalk and walked up the walkway toward the porch. She went up the steps, her heart pounding just a little from remember the last time that she had come up these steps, _wearing a suit and high heels_.

Michonne opened the door and stepped inside, her katana still grasped in her hand. The house looked like it might have been looted. A lot of things were overturned, though much of that could have happened in the scuffle that had taken place there and she might not have noticed then. _She'd had other things on her mind._ As she made her way through the house with Daryl close behind her, she was surprised when a figure appeared in front of her.

It wasn't a Walker that surprised Michonne, rather it was a woman, holding a gun. Behind her stood a child, whether it was hers or not, Michonne had no idea, but the woman was at least responsible for guarding the girl, who looked to be about six or seven.

"Easy," Michonne said. The woman looked terrified, but Michonne knew full well that a terrified mother was also a mother that would kill without thinking about it. "We don't mean any harm," she said softly. "I used to live here, and I wanted to get a few things, but they'd be of no value to you, if they're still here."

The woman looked a little panicked, like she was unsure of what she should do. She made no move to lower her weapon. Michonne made a conscious effort to soften her face.

"We'll put away our weapons, if you'll put away yours. I promise that we mean you no harm. I just want a few things and you can have the house. I'd give you the title if I had it," she said, concentrating on keeping her voice as soft and soothing as she could.

The woman just stood there, still making no move to lower her weapon.

"Daryl, lower your crossbow," Michonne said. She slowly made a move to sheathe her katana. As soon as she did so, the woman lowered the gun, but didn't put it in the holster she wore around her waist.

"What do you want?" The woman asked, finally.

"Nothing of value, really," Michonne said. "I want a photo album that was upstairs, and a few things out of one of the rooms upstairs that belonged to my daughters."

"Fine," the woman said, "but I'm watching you."

"Fair enough," Michonne said. Daryl was silent behind her.

Daryl didn't know what to do. The woman seemed like she didn't really want to hurt them, and she was trying to negotiate with Michonne, but he didn't like that she still had the gun in her hands. He had lowered his own weapon, but he held it in his hand as well. He didn't want to shoot this woman, and wouldn't shoot her if he didn't have to, but if she made a move to shoot Michonne he wouldn't have any other choice.

Michonne slowly made her way toward the stairs, aware that she was being flanked by Daryl, the frightened woman, and the silent girl. At the top of the stairs she moved toward what had been her bedroom at one time.

They'd obviously been sleeping in the bed there, but otherwise the room seemed fairly untouched. The woman stepped in behind Michonne, as did Daryl.

Michonne walked to the bookshelf. She was relieved to see that it was just as she had left it. Immediately she located the photo album and plucked it from the shelf.

"This is it," she said. The woman eyed her, suspiciously still.

Michonne thought about it a moment. She didn't blame the woman at all. If she had claimed this house, then it was all that she had as a home. Michonne couldn't imagine how she'd react if she and Daryl were suddenly face to face with the former tenants of their house, though she knew that wouldn't happen since she'd put down those tenants herself. She also couldn't imagine what it would be like to come face to face with both herself and Daryl, armed because they suspected the possibility of Walkers. They knew that they were harmless unless threatened, but perhaps they wouldn't appear that way to someone who didn't know them, and who knew nothing about them. She wasn't sure how she'd respond if she were the woman.

As Michonne slowly knelt to put the album in the bag that she carried slung over her shoulder, the woman looked a little more relieved. It was becoming obvious to her that Michonne and Daryl truly meant no harm and that Michonne really only wanted the worthless items that she had declared she wanted.

"Just one more thing," Michonne said, slowly standing up. She started back out the room, gently brushing past the little girl that was silently standing in the doorway. She started toward her daughter's room, taking a deep breath. The girl rushed ahead to the door she was walking toward.

"That's my room!" The little girl yelped, running in front of Michonne.

Michonne kneeled down in front of the girl.

"Anna!" The woman cried.

Michonne held her hand up.

"It's fine," Michonne said. Kneeling she was eyelevel with the little girl. "I'm not going to take anything you want," Michonne said softly. "I promise. That used to be my daughter's room, and if anything that was hers makes you happy, then I want you to have it. I promise that what I want is in a box in the closet, and you probably never even knew it was there, and when I get it, you probably won't want it, but if you really do want it, I'll let you have it. Deal?"

The little girl nodded, and Michonne got back up. She walked into the room and burrowed through a box she found in the closet. Keeping her promise she showed the girl the three baby bottles that she'd produced from the box.

"See? I don't think you really want these, do you?" Michonne asked.

The girl looked at them for a minute, and then shook her head.

Michonne smiled and put them in her bag. She put the bag back on her shoulder and turned around.

"Thank you," she said to the woman, who still held her gun in her hands.

"You're welcome," the woman said finally.

"We'll be going now," Michonne said. "Good luck to you, and good luck to Anna."

The woman thanked her quietly, and then followed Michonne and Daryl back to the door. They exited the house and went back to the car, ridding the world of three more Walkers in the process.

"That was weird," Daryl said, when they were in the car.

"I guess they're squatting there," Michonne said. "Let's go find Glenn and Maggie, and get the trucks loaded, OK?"

Daryl realized she didn't want to talk about anything right now, but he hoped she'd talk to him later. Maybe she'd let him see that photo album that she'd put in her bag. He wanted to see her life before, he wanted to see what Michonne had been like before she'd become the Michonne that he knew.

Michonne and Daryl found Maggie and Glenn fairly quickly. Glenn had found another truck, and had siphoned enough gas to get it back to the community with ease. They were loading the trucks and had gotten a good start. Michonne and Daryl quickly fell into place. By the time they decided it was time to head back, Daryl taking the second truck, they'd put more than a dent in raiding most of the stores that would be of interest to them, and they'd gotten even more than they expected of the items that they'd come after.

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Michonne sat on the bed and pulled the photo album out of her bag, putting it on the bed. Daryl would be up shortly. He was bringing bath water, having agreed to wait for theirs while she put Hope down, since the baby was exhausted. She'd eaten and gone down quickly and Michonne wanted to look at the album a moment alone. She wanted to get the sting over with before Daryl got there, knowing full well that he would want to see it.

She opened the pages, rubbing her fingertips over them gently. She felt her chest close up a little, and she felt hot tears on her cheeks, though she'd declared to herself that she wasn't going to cry.

When Daryl came in the room carrying the bucket of almost boiling hot water, he hadn't expected to find Michonne silently crying and slumped over the open book on her lap. He quickly sat the bucket down and rushed over to her, sitting next to her and pulling her against him.

On the open pages in front of him he could see a younger Michonne, dressed in a soft yellow dress, her dreadlocks pulled up and pinned with a yellow flower of a similar color, smiling back at him. Hugged against her were two pretty little girls, one slightly smaller than the other, smiling back. One was dressed in a light pink dress, her hair in braids, and the other in a light purple dress, her hair in pigtails.

"It's OK, 'Chonne," Daryl said, "you can cry if you need to."

Michonne hugged him and he carefully moved the book off her lap and held her.

"They was pretty, 'Chonne," he said. "They was real pretty."

Michonne calmed after a minute, wiping her face on Daryl's shirt. He didn't mind. She pulled away from him slightly and reached for the book. He returned it to her.

"That was Angelica, and that was Celine," Michonne said, starting to tear up again.

Daryl saw a slight resemblance between the two girls and Hope.

"I think this picture was taken about two months before…" Michonne stopped, "before everything happened," she finished.

Daryl carefully rubbed her back. When she was calm again, she started flipping through the pages. Daryl watched them all, listening to her narrate the photos, and comforting her when she needed it. She had apparently removed all the photos of her ex-husband, as there were quite a few with ripped edges. There were the births of both the girls, a sweaty, but excited Michonne holding both of them. There were candid pictures and professional ones from all stages of their lives. Daryl drank them in. The Michonne in the pictures was different, but only in that she wore a lighter expression all the time, and her clothes were different. She wore lipstick on many of them, and dresses, and she was younger, but Daryl couldn't really tell if that had so much to do with time or if it had to with experience. He hadn't looked at himself lately in the mirror, except when he was shaving, but he was sure that he'd aged a lot since all this had happened.

"These were my parents," Michonne said, showing him a photo of an older woman sitting in a chair while an older gentleman stood behind her, his hands folded on her shoulder.

"Didja have good parents, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked. Both the faces looking back at him looked like kind faces. He didn't know if anyone had ever taken a picture of his parents. If they had, he'd never seen it.

"I did, Daryl, I had wonderful parents," Michonne said. "I'm glad that they went before all of this happened."

"What were their names, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked, trying to get to know the two faces looking back at him.

"My mother was Esther, and my father was Zebulon, but everyone called him Zeb. My father called my mother Essie," Michonne said.

"I thought you said your little girl was named after your mother?" Daryl asked.

"Angelica was named after my grandmother," Michonne corrected. "My mother never liked her name, so she didn't want me naming one of the girls after her."

"Zebulon, huh?" Daryl said. "Do you think your daddy woulda liked me?"

Michonne's parents had been a little snobbish about education, wanting the best for their children, but she could remember that her father had always told her that the most important thing for him was that she found a man that loved her and took care of her. It was important that he treat her like she deserved to be treated. She thought about it a moment, and smiled at Daryl, pulling him to her and kissing him gently.

"I think he would have thought you were perfect, just like me," she said.

Daryl grinned.

"I like that name, 'Chonne. I like Zeb. Do you think we could name our little boy that?" Daryl said.

"I thought maybe you'd want to name him Daryl," Michonne said, indulging Daryl's daydream a little.

"Nah, we don't need that many Daryl's runnin' 'round here, one's plenty," Daryl said. "But Zeb Dixon, that's a nice name, ain't it?"

"It is, Daryl," Michonne said, smiling. "It is a good name."

Daryl thought for a minute. Michonne could tell that he was pretty deep in thought, and she knew that he would eventually tell her what he was thinking, so she left him alone.

"'Chonne," Daryl said after a minute, "I know things ain't like I thought they'd be, but maybe that's 'cause I was thinkin' 'bout 'em wrong. I know they wasn't mine then, 'Chonne, but do you reckon' I could think of your little girls as my little girls? I mean maybe my kids didn't come out even, maybe I had three little girls…"

Michonne smiled at him. "Daryl, I think that would be just fine," she said softly.

She thought about it. Her husband had been a father, in that he'd gotten her pregnant twice, but he had never been much of a _daddy_ to the girls. He'd treated the girls like a chore or an obligation, but not at all like something he _wanted_. When she was pregnant the first time, with Celine, he'd seemed a little interested, but not when he realized that that baby was going to keep them up at night, and when she'd gotten pregnant again, only three months after Celine was born, he hadn't been pleased at all. He'd gone in search of something different, something _better_.

Daryl was a _daddy_ to Hope. He doted on the little girl, kept her with him whenever he could, and loved her as deeply as he could. Michonne had often been uncomfortable knowing her husband was alone for even a few hours with the girls, but Daryl could disappear with Hope for most of the day and she never worried. If Daryl _had_ been the father to her girls, she may not have found them like she had.

"I wish you had met them," Michonne said. "They would have loved you."

Daryl wiped a tear off Michonne's cheek with the back of his hand.

"I would love them too," he said.

"As long as we're admitting that your family might not be _exactly_ how you pictured it," Michonne ventured, "do you think you might have had _four_ little girls?"

Daryl smiled. "Nah, I got me a boy in there, 'Chonne, I'm sure of that."

Michonne smiled again, and faked a sigh. She knew that Daryl would be perfectly happy if they had another girl, but he wasn't giving up on the idea of a son until Carol presented him with a screeching baby that sealed the deal.

"Let's get washed, 'Chonne, and then how about we get us some sleep. You look tired," Daryl said.

"I am tired," Michonne admitted.

When they got in bed, having both bathed quickly with the slightly chilled bath water, Michonne snuggled up against Daryl. In the lamplight she could see that he was gazing off into space, a slight smile on his face.

"What are you thinking about, Daryl?" She asked.

"Just thinkin' 'bout my family, 'Chonne." Daryl said. "It's one beautiful family I got me."

Michonne smiled and kissed his chest, snuggling into him.

"Did you want to make love?" She asked.

Daryl thought about it. There was never a time that he didn't want to make love to Michonne, but he thought that tonight would be one of those nights that she wouldn't want him to worry about her. He decided he wouldn't push it tonight, he'd just be happy with his thoughts.

"Nah, 'Chonne, you go on to sleep," he said, squeezing her slightly.

Michonne looked struck, and Daryl didn't understand it.

"What's wrong, 'Chonne?" He asked.

"Nothing, Daryl," Michonne said.

"You don't make that face for nothin' 'Chonne," Daryl responded.

"I don't know, I guess I was just hoping that you wanted to make love," Michonne said. "It doesn't matter, though."

Daryl pulled her face toward him and moved out from under her enough to reach her. He kissed her.

"Hey, I didn't mean I didn't want to if you wanted to, I just didn't think you'd want to. I _do_ want to, 'Chonne, if you want to," Daryl said.

"I want to, Daryl," Michonne said, "please."

Daryl smiled and kissed her again. His hands snaked across her body, enjoying the feel of her velvety skin on his palms. Michonne rarely really _asked_ him to make love to her, since he was normally the first to voice his interest, and he was more than delighted to indulge her if that was what she wanted.


	57. Chapter 57

**AN: I'd like to post this disclaimer here, since soon it may become necessary.**

**I'm not a farmer, nor do engage in many of the activities that my characters will be engaged in, that being said, Google is my friend and I have been having conversations (after I explained why) with some people that I know that **_**do/have **_**engaged in these activities (farming by hand, smoking and drying meat in smokehouses, etc.)**

**That being said, I ask you to hold tight to your suspension of disbelief with minor details. Though I'm trying to be as thorough as I can in making sure I have at least a decent grasp on anything I'll be discussing, there may be some things that are not 100% correct, nor do I claim to be an expert, I'm simply going to do the best I can to bring you the most correct depictions that I am able to provide. **

**That being said, I hope you enjoy as we continue on. **

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It was the first mild days that they'd seen, though it was certainly no sign that spring was upon them. It was a sign, however, that spring was coming. It wouldn't be long before the layers that they'd momentarily shed were layers that they wouldn't need to pull back on when temperatures dropped again.

There was something about the touch of warmth in the air and the first few minor signs that the world was waking up from its frosty slumber that was rejuvenating to everyone. It was like the world was returning to life, starting again after the icy winter, and that made you just feel hopeful, expectant. Even with as bleak as things could be at times, there was some animalistic "self" inside all of them that seemed to sense the coming of spring and respond by feeling more alive.

Michonne wandered over to the area where Tyreese was, with the help of Glenn and Rick, working hard toward finishing the smokehouses they'd been working on. The structures were larger than Michonne had imagined they'd be, each taking up an entire sizable yard of the community. Tyreese must be pretty confident in Daryl's hunting and tracking abilities because he was preparing for quite the amount of meat to be brought in.

Maggie and Glenn had taken some of the younger ones on another run. They'd been doing runs like crazy. The woman and child that Michonne and Daryl had found squatting in her old home, as well as the community that they knew existed out there somewhere, in very close proximity, were just two small reminders that they were sharing this area with an unknown number of others, and Maggie had become fiercely determined to gather _everything_ before anyone else got their hands on it.

Michonne had noticed a certain something in Maggie when they went on runs lately. Each box of supplies she found was like a high for Maggie, it did something to her mood. If anyone so much as mentioned when or if they might move on in the future, Maggie's mood would immediately sink, but each box of supplies they found, each shelf that they filled, would raise it higher and higher.

Michonne was fairly certain that she had an idea what was causing the change. Maggie had begun to associate movement with danger, with death, and with uncertainty. While it was true that they all somewhat related moving on to these things, for Maggie it had become an extreme connection. Everything they had, everything they found and collected, meant more time that they weren't moving, and she wasn't risking that the other groups get ahold of things that could cost them time. Stocking had become an obsession for her, but they all had their obsessions, and hers was harmless. It helped the group and it did insure them a longer "stay" period.

The other groups in the area had become a silent concern for everyone. No one really knew what to expect. They hadn't encountered others face to face since Michonne and Daryl had found the squatters, but they were waiting for the day that it happened. They lived rather openly, burning fires for cooking and heating water whenever they wanted, and the constant ins and outs of hauling things and going on runs could draw the attention of anyone nearby. It was just a matter of time before they had to come face to face with other survivors. No one knew exactly how they felt about the possible future encounters. Michonne felt they were more likely with the weather warming up. Wherever the other groups were holding up against the cold, they might be more inclined to explore the area once they weren't worried about both Walkers _and_ frost.

As Michonne lingered around, watching for a moment the progress on the smokehouses, she was joined by Carol, who was bringing water out to the men. She paused a little longer with Tyreese than she did with the others, quickly pecking him on the lips and then brushing her hand on his arm as she walked away from him and toward Michonne, her smile lingering. Michonne also didn't miss that Tyreese turned as Carol walked toward her and watched her walking away.

"What are you up to?" Carol asked, walking up.

"Just trying to figure out where I'm most useful," Michonne said.

"Probably down at the demo site. Everyone is working like crazy down there. I'm about to take some water down there, I can walk with you," Carol said.

"Sure, I'll help you carry it," Michonne said. She followed Carol to collect up one of the two buckets that she was taking down to those that were already working.

The demolition crews were working like crazy these days. All the land that they'd decided would be for planting had already been cleared, hoed, and was ready to go. This was causing everyone to turn their attention to trying to take down more of the houses and take up more of the streets in that area. It was like they viewed every square inch of possible ground that they could clear as adding a tangible amount of time to their stay, and they were giving it all they had to increase that space as much as possible before it was time to plant.

"So, have you and Tyreese said it yet?" Michonne asked when she was walking with Carol.

"Said what?" Carol asked.

"You know, said you love each other?" Michonne responded, smiling.

"No, we haven't said it yet," Carol said. "I don't even know if he feels that way…I don't even know if _I _feel that way."

"Come on, Carol, it's written all over your face. You look at him like some kind of lovesick schoolgirl, and you know it," Michonne said.

Carol stopped walking and Michonne stopped with her.

"I've never _had_ anyone in my life like Tyreese before. I've known other women that were married to men like him, but I could never imagine it, not with Ed," Carol said.

"So? I've never had anyone like Daryl, and he's never had anyone before, it doesn't mean it isn't real," Michonne said.

"I don't know, I don't want to be the first to say it," Carol said.

"Do you think that saying it will make it not real?" Michonne asked.

"I don't know how he'd respond if I said it," Carol said.

"Well, do you think he loves you too? I mean it's clear to see how he looks at you. He doesn't look at you like someone who doesn't love the person their looking at. Maybe he _wants_ you to be the first to say it. You know, Tyreese could be just as nervous as you are. He might think if he says it first you'll go running away," Michonne said.

"I don't know," Carol said, "it might be too soon."

Michonne picked up her bucket again.

"I don't think there's any such thing as too soon anymore, not when it comes to telling people you care about them. We may not have too many tomorrows left to back up the 'I'll say something tomorrow' mentality, but if you don't feel it, then I guess you shouldn't say it," Michonne said.

"How did you know for sure that you loved Daryl?" Carol asked.

Michonne smiled.

"Well, honestly I was pregnant with Hope before I ever said it, but I think I knew a long time before that. I think I knew I loved him when I realized that I couldn't imagine my life anymore without him in it. I didn't want to imagine my life without him in it," she said.

"Daryl's different than Tyreese, though, I mean it was obvious from the minute that Daryl decided the two of you were together that nothing was going to change that," Carol said.

"And how is Tyreese different? Has he given you any indication that he's any less dedicated to your relationship? He might not be as clingy as Daryl, but that doesn't mean that he's not just as loyal," Michonne offered.

They started walking again.

"Tyreese might still be looking for something better, you know? Something that could be a better match for him. I'm not really what he needs," Carol said. "He could find something better out there."

Michonne stopped again and caught Carol by the arm.

"I, for one, don't think anyone could do much better, Carol. Remember that some of these are your insecurities, and hopefully you'll overcome them one day, but don't put them on Tyreese. I don't think it would enter his mind that there's anything better than you out there, so don't hold yourself back from him just because you haven't worked over some obstacles. You're a wonderful woman, and I think that Tyreese sees that, I think it's maybe just _you_ who hasn't seen it yet," Michonne said.

Carol smiled at her, but she didn't say anything. They continued on in silence to the demolition sight where Michonne quickly went to work with the others, leaving Carol behind, commenting on the progress that was being made and handing out water to those that had already worked up quite a thirst.

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Michonne lie in bed that night and told Daryl stories, which she listened to him repeat back to her, with his own little twists. Ever since he'd first seen pictures of the girls he'd wanted to know everything about them. He wanted to know first words, first steps, favorite colors, favorite animals, everything.

At first it had been hard on Michonne to answer all of his questions. Every time she thought of them or talked about them, all she could remember was the last time that she saw them. All the feelings came crashing down on her from the last time that she held them, knowing that they were gone from her forever.

But as she continued to tell the stories of the happier times in their lives, and she continued to listen to him retell the stories, painting them ever so slightly different by inserting himself and telling her what he would have done if he'd been part of the story, it had become much easier to talk about them. Now when she thought about them, it wasn't so much about that final day, instead it was more about all the wonderful days before that.

There were stories about a trip to the zoo, but now instead of just an exhausted Michonne lugging two toddlers around the zoo, barely able to enjoy their excitement through her own exhaustion and resentment at the men in her life that were above taking two young girls to see the animals, there was Daryl there, telling her about how he'd lift them up at the exhibits to see the zebras and the lions, right over the tops of the heads of any inconsiderate tall people that would try to block their view. There were stories of birthday parties, pony rides, and petting zoos, all retold to her with a refreshing Daryl perspective.

As Michonne listened to Daryl's versions of the stories that she told him, listened to how he reshaped them in his head in to what they _should_ have been, she slowly started to really understand how Daryl's imaginary family could have pulled him through a lot of bad times in his life. It really was nice to get inside the world that he painted. She could even imagine herself there and, though she wasn't ever much of a cook, she could see herself serving her family some elaborate meal at dinnertime where they'd all sit and laugh and talk about their day. His family, the one that he spent time with in his head, was a family that was built entirely on love. Everyone loved everyone, and everyone was happy. He simply wouldn't allow it to be any other way.

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Carol had been starting and stopping all night like she was going to say something. Tyreese wanted her to just say whatever was on her mind, but he had no idea what that was, so he was trying to be patient and let her work it out for herself. Finally, she started again and then stopped and he couldn't take it any longer.

"What's on your mind, Carol?" He asked. He felt her sort of flinch, and he hugged her a little. "Easy, Carol," he said in a soft voice, "what's going on?"

"Nothing," she said, "it's not important."

"Whatever it is, it's had you sighing for at least an hour, why don't you just tell me what it is and we'll talk about it, even if it's not important," Tyreese offered.

"I was just…" Carol started, "I don't know if you…"

Tyreese laughed a little.

"Spit it out, Carol, just don't think about whatever it is and spit it out. We'll work out the bugs once I know what's got you so uptight," he said.

"I…," Carol paused again and took a deep breath, "I think I love you," she blurted, finally. She closed her eyes, involuntarily flinching a little.

Tyreese was quiet, trying to process what she'd just said, and trying to process his own feelings. He hadn't thought about whether or not he loved Carol, or even what it meant to love someone new in this world. Everything these days happened so quickly, life happened quickly, death happened quickly, perhaps it was only natural to think that love would happen just as quickly as anything else.

Tyreese was only certain that he had loved one woman in his life before all this happened, and that had been Lizzie. He had loved Lizzie more than he'd ever thought he could. There had been women before her, and there had been women after her, but none had ever had the impact on him that Lizzie had.

One thing he knew for sure, Carol was unlike any of the women he'd ever had in his life. He'd always been attracted to strong, independent, _powerful_ women. Lizzie had been that kind of woman. She'd taken control of situations, taken control of _him_, and he'd loved that about her. He had often thought that's why he was attracted to Michonne when he'd first joined the group. She was the kind of woman that took control of a man, the kind that let a man know that if she gave him the reigns, it was of her own choosing, not because he had any real control. Carol couldn't be less like that if she tried to be.

Carol was a strong woman, of that he had no doubt. If she hadn't been strong, she wouldn't have survived this long without cracking underneath everything. The world before would have cracked her, the scars on her body were a written testament to her strength, and the world since, especially with the burden she quietly carried as she tried to pull the weight of three or four women, surely would have broken her. She was strong, and she'd been, to at least some degree, independent, but she wasn't one to take control of any man.

Carol was soft and gentle. She was coming more into herself with Tyreese, but there constant reminders that she was battling demons he wasn't sure he wanted to know about, but to him the important part was that she was battling them.

Carol was fragile in his mind. He'd often told her that she was too thin. She needed to eat more. He could feel more of her bones than he was comfortable with, and no matter how hard she hugged him or held him when they were alone together, he always restrained himself from holding her equally as tight, afraid that he might hurt her, or might break something. She seemed that fragile to him.

Yet there was something about her, and something he felt toward her that he'd never felt before. He felt like she _needed_ him, and he wasn't sure he'd ever known a woman that needed him. She had started to trust him, and part of that trust was that he'd protect her, that he'd keep her from being harmed. He didn't know, exactly, what she thought he'd protect her from, it wasn't Walkers, but she seemed to think he'd protect her from something.

He didn't know if it was love, exactly, but he'd come to savor certain moments. In particular he'd come to savor the times that she fell asleep on him most of all. It was then that she was the most vulnerable, a state he knew frightened her, but she felt safe enough with him to fall asleep right there with her head on his chest. Maybe that's what love was in this day and age, maybe love was enjoying the feeling of knowing that someone who had once been frightened by you now found your presence comforting enough to sleep, lying softly against you.

"I'm sorry," Carol stammered, "I'm sorry…"

Tyreese was snapped out of his thoughts.

"What?" He said.

"I'm sorry," she repeated. "I guess it was too soon, I didn't mean to upset you."

Tyreese realized that he'd been silent too long and she'd misinterpreted the silence for him being upset by her declaration of love.

"I'm not upset, Carol," he said. "I was just thinking. I was thinking about how different you are from the last woman that I loved."

Carol raised her head up, and though it was dark, Tyreese could tell that she was looking at him.

"So you…" she let her voice trail off, but she didn't move.

"Love you? Yes, Carol, I do love you," Tyreese said. "You just made me think of my wife, and I guess I got a little lost for a minute."

"You were married before?" Carol asked, sinking back down against him. She was so soft against him. He smiled and rubbed her back.

"Yes I was. Her name was Elizabeth, but I called her Lizzie because she _hated_ when anyone called her Lizzie, but she liked it when I did," Tyreese said.

"Did you lose her when this all started?" Carol asked softly.

"No, I lost Lizzie a long time ago. After that, I spent most of my time looking after Julie. I had my hands full with her. There were a few women after Lizzie, but none of them meant much," Tyreese said.

"Who was Julie?" Carol asked.

"My daughter," Tyreese said.

"You didn't tell me you had a daughter," Carol said.

"No one ever asked," Tyreese said.

He waited quietly for a minute for her to ask about his daughter and if he'd lost her when it all started, but Carol didn't ask. He knew she was sensitive about asking too many questions about life before.

"Lizzie passed away from cancer when Julie was little. I did the best I could with the girl, but I lost her when all this happened," he said. He knew she wouldn't ask him for details, and for that he was thankful.

"So you were a single father?" Carol asked.

Tyreese chuckled a little. "Yeah, I guess that's what you could call it," he said.

Carol knew there was something of a caretaker in Tyreese. He was very delicate with her, very aware of her feelings and what she wanted or needed. Maybe some of that had come from raising a child on his own, or maybe it had been what had helped him raise a child on his own. That was a chicken and egg question, and Carol knew it was of very little importance. She realized then that she knew so little about his life before, and she felt bad at first. Then she thought about it a little more. None of them really knew all that much about each other's lives before all this, they knew some of the details, but only the ones that they chose to share. There was a lot that he didn't know about her, though he either knew or suspected some of it. Still, no matter what she knew or didn't know about his life, she was certain of her feelings for him. He'd said he loved her too, and she wanted to believe it, wanted to believe it more than anything else that she'd heard in a long time.

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Michonne finished feeding Hope after Beth found her, declaring that the baby was putting up more than a fight for milk after she'd eaten what solid food they could get her take for lunch. She returned the baby to Beth's care and went in search of Daryl, whom she hadn't seen for most of the day. She found Daryl over by himself, fashioning a pile of wire contraptions and wooden contraptions.

"What are you doing?" She asked, sitting down in the dirt near him.

"Makin' frames and stakes," he said, matter-of-factly. "Some of what Carol's gonna try to grow won't get there on its own, it's gonna needa lil' help so I'm makin' some stuff to help it out."

"Well aren't you handy?" Michonne said, smiling at him as he bit his tongue slightly, bending some wire into place.

"Just think about it, 'Chonne, pretty soon we'll be growin' most of what we need right here, and we'll be able to pick it an' eat it, an' we won't have to worry so much 'bout how much we got us in storage 'cause we'll be storin' up all kinds of stuff," he said, still not looking at her.

"You're right, Daryl, we'll be growing a lot of things," she said.

"You growin' us nothin' yet, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked.

"I don't think so, Daryl," Michonne said, "but you'll be second, or probably third to know when I am."

"Why I gotta be third?" He asked, still not looking up from his work.

"Carol's got a way of smelling these things out. I imagine it'll be like it was with Hope. She'll be the first to know, then she'll let me in on it, and then I'll tell you. Either way, you'll know as soon as I do," Michonne said.

"I reckon that's good enough for me, 'Chonne, but I hope it don't take too long," Daryl said.

"Be patient, Daryl, I already told you that I'm not a gumball machine," Michonne said. She got to her feet, and started to walk off, stopping to ruffle his hair. He grabbed her leg and kissed her on the thigh.

"I know that, 'Chonne, don't you worry," he said.

When he let go, Michonne walked toward the demolition crew, ready to help them add a few more feet to the land that they saw as their salvation.


	58. Chapter 58

The rain beating on the roof of the covered porch was soothing. Michonne was curled up in one of the porch chairs with Hope, and a bunch of pillows that she'd collected, deciding that the cushion that had been in the chair wasn't sufficient for the level of comfort that she wanted to achieve while listening to the relaxing sound. Across the porch from her, Carol sat in the swing, mending clothes from a box she had next to her. Judith was sitting on the floor building towers with blocks and knocking them over promptly, squealing with joy each time they came crashing down. Hope had been playing with her, but apparently her mother's lap had looked more inviting than all the toys.

"I really wanted to do laundry today," Carol said, "not mending."

"Do you want me to help you?" Michonne asked.

"No, I'm fine. I don't mind it too much. It gives me time to think, or time to chat if you're feeling chatty," Carol said, not looking up from her work.

This rain was a pouring downfall, the kind that shut everything down around the community. You could work through small showers, Carol could even get fires going to some degree when it was light enough, but today there wouldn't even be any hot food. It wasn't possible to start a fire when it was like this.

"What is it they say, April showers bring May flowers?" Michonne asked.

"That's what they say, but I am almost certain that it's not April yet, March maybe, but not April. It won't be too much longer, though, and then we'll be planting," Carol said.

"That's kind of exciting, I am really looking forward to eating something fresh for a change," Michonne said.

"Some of it we'll eat right away, but a lot we'll be putting up. Maggie and Glenn really scored in finding me a ton of Mason jars," Carol said. "I'm going to need help with that, so I guess you'll be helping me," Carol said.

"Why me? I don't have the slightest clue about canning," Michonne said. She really didn't feel confident with many of the more domestic tasks that Carol did. She had never been much of a cook, and she wasn't that good at sewing. The laundry she could handle from time to time, but the idea of canning, something she knew nothing about, seemed a little overwhelming.

"Well, I'm guessing that by the time we'll be ready to start canning anything you will be waiting on a baby, so I'll have you as a captive audience, I'm sure it won't be that hard to teach you what to do. I could use the help, too. I haven't figured out yet how Daryl thinks I'm going to be juggling all the tasks I've got to work through without some extra hands," Carol said.

"I'm sure if you told him that you needed hands, he'd give them to you. We've got plenty of people to go around," Michonne said.

"Well, it's certainly going to be an all hands on deck experience when we're planting, there's no way around that. Everyone is going to have to be involved," Carol said.

"I'm sure everyone is going to be more than happy to be involved in that," Michonne said, "you won't have any argument there," Michonne said.

Daryl came out on the porch a few minutes later, he walked to the edge of it and looked out for a minute, not saying anything. He was a little frustrated by the rain. He'd rather be out there working at the demo site than sitting in the house waiting for the storm to pass.

"Daryl, sit down, there's no use fretting about the rain. It'll stop when it's ready to stop," Michonne said.

Daryl sighed and came over, taking a seat next to her and dragging it right next to her chair so that he could play with Hope while she sat in her lap.

"We could get a lot done in a day, and we're runnin' outta days. I just wish all this rain would hold off until we got everything in the ground. Then it could water the crops insteada keepin' us all cooped up when we could be clearin' more land," Daryl said.

"Worrying won't make it stop, Daryl, and besides, I hope we don't get a rain like this right away. It could wash the seeds out of the ground if we're not careful, and then we really would have a mess," Carol said. "Why don't you go upstairs and get me that shirt you tore the other day? I can fix it while we're sitting here and you'll have it back as soon as I get a chance to do the laundry," Carol said.

Daryl got up and went back in the house.

"The key," Carol said, "is to try to keep him busy."

Michonne snickered.

"What do you propose we have him do when he gets back?" Michonne asked.

"I've got more than a few bobbins of thread and needles tucked around that I'm going to need him to fetch. If he does that one at a time, I might be able to come up with a little more to keep him occupied," Carol said, smiling at Michonne.

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Daryl was alone in the house. Carol was missing, Hope was missing, and Michonne was missing. If Tyreese had slept over the night before, he was missing too. Daryl was all by himself, _except for Judith_. He hadn't been fully awake when Judith had started to cry, and by the time he got dressed and got in her room, she was hysterical.

"What is it, Jude?" He asked, coming in the room.

"Duck!" She screamed out at him, through her sobs. "Mine duck!"

Daryl looked in her crib for the familiar yellow and orange creature that she drug everywhere. He picked up blankets, moved a sippy cup of water to the changing table, and looked around, but the duck wasn't in the crib. He offered her a dog that was in there, but she refused that adamantly, still not subsiding with her screeching.

"Look, Jude, it ain't in here," he said.

"Duck! Mine duck!" She kept commanding at him, alternating between screaming and these forced sobbing sounds.

"I know you want the duck, but I ain't got it," he said.

Daryl looked in Hope's crib, thinking maybe Michonne had absentmindedly moved the darn thing. There was nothing in Hope's crib either. Now Judith was holding on to the top of the crib and shaking it violently. Her face was all red.

_Damn kid's gonna blow up._ Daryl thought to himself.

"Caw! Caw!" Judith screamed at him.

"I ain't got that neither!" Daryl responded. He looked around the room but there was no sign of the toy. Finally, he got down on his hands and knees and looked up under all the furniture. _Damn duck couldn'ta just flown away._

Daryl finally plucked the screaming child out of her crib. She continued crying in his arms, something she rarely did.

"Listen, Jude, you gotta listen to me," Daryl said.

Judith responded by looking directly at him. She stopped screaming, but giant tears were still rolling down her face and now she was hiccupping.

"I ain't got him, but that don't me I ain't gonna find him, but I can't find him with you screamin' like that," Daryl said. "Now, I bet your ma knows where he is an' we're gonna go find her, but you gotta have clothes on, so can you hold it together for me to get you dressed?"

Judith didn't respond to him, but she didn't start screaming, so he took that as a yes. He rummaged through the drawers and put the first shirt and pair of pants that he could find on her. She hadn't protested, at least not much, she'd just sucked on first one set of fingers, and then the others, while he'd struggled to get her into the clothes.

He scooped her up and started out of the house, hoping that Carol wasn't far off.

When Daryl came up carrying Judith, who was hiccupping and looked like she'd been crying, Carol stopped what she was doing with the laundry and got up, drying her hands on her pants.

"What's wrong, Daryl? Did something happen?" She asked. Judith reached for her and she took her from Daryl, noticing for a moment the polka dotted shorts and striped shirt that she was wearing, and deciding that Michonne must have slipped out the house after her with Hope, leaving Daryl to dress the child.

"She wants her damn duck and I can't find the damn thing nowhere," Daryl said, a little irritated.

"It's OK, Daryl, calm down," Carol said. "I can only handle one upset person at a time."

Carol carried Judith over to the drying lines where the duck, which she had stolen that morning and replaced with another stuffed animal while Judith was sleeping, was hanging precariously, pinned by one wing.

"Look, Judith, he's fine. He just had a bath this morning. You know how much you like baths?" Carol asked, kissing Judith's cheek and nuzzling her a little.

Judith didn't remove her fingers from her mouth, but she nodded a little, her eyes not leaving her friend which was pinned right next to someone's shirt.

"Well, he likes baths too, and he was really dirty, so he asked me if he could have a bath. I'll give him back to you as soon as he's done drying off, OK?" Carol asked.

Judith looked at her, but she was much calmer now.

"Come on, let's go get some breakfast," Carol said to Judith. "Daryl, come on, I have some breakfast for you too."

Daryl came over and followed Carol inside to get breakfast.

"The next time you gonna do somethin' like that, at least tell me. I don't know what to do with her all freakin' out like that an' expectin' me to fix it," Daryl said, following in Carol's footsteps.

"You better get used to freak outs, Daryl. You're planning on having two little ones to give you a run for your money, and don't think they won't have their moments. The key is to remain calm. The calmer you are, the calmer they'll be," Carol said. "Now go sit down and I'll bring you a plate. You can feed Judith for me while you're at it."

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"Stop worrying about it, Daryl," Michonne said that night. Daryl had been worrying all day about the episode with Judith that morning, though the girl was happily asleep in her crib right now.

Daryl huffed at her.

"I just don't wanna be no bad daddy, 'Chonne. I don't wanna mess up," Daryl said.

"Daryl, do you honestly think that because you couldn't completely calm down an irate toddler that means you'll be a bad daddy?" Michonne asked. Daryl was silent. "Would you like to ask Hope what she thinks about it, or even Judith for that matter? They both adore you."

"She wouldn't stop cryin'," Daryl said. "I couldn't make her stop cryin'."

"Because you didn't have what she wanted, but it doesn't mean you did anything wrong," Michonne reasoned. "Listen, Daryl, there are only three bottles that Hope will willingly drink out of for Carol if I'm not around, and those are the three I brought from my house. My girls wouldn't drink out of any other kind of bottle. Do you know why?"

"Why?" Daryl asked.

"Because of the nipple. The nipple is shaped a little bit differently on those bottles than it is on the ones we've found around here. Apparently it's more like mine for my children's tastes. Judith won't drink water at bedtime out of just any sippy cup, it _has _to be that one with the purple lid," Michonne said.

"So, what's that got to do with anything?" Daryl asked.

Michonne ran her finger around his chest, her body curled into him and her head in the crook of his arm.

"Children, especially toddlers, can be very picky about things. It doesn't mean that you're a bad parent if you can't make them happy all the time. They're stuck at a point where they can't communicate with you entirely, and they can't reason at the same level that you can. You knew you were trying to find the duck, but all Judith could see was that she still didn't have it, that doesn't make you a bad guy," Michonne said.

Daryl was still silent.

"Daryl, Hope is not always going to be happy with us, and with the decisions that we make or what happens around her. That's going to be even more the case if we go on the move again. While we're here, we can indulge them as much as possible, but there's never been a child in the history of the world that thought their parents were perfect, at least not in the moment. That doesn't mean their parents aren't good parents," Michonne said.

"I just don't wanna be a bad daddy," Daryl said.

"You're not, and you're not going to turn into a bad daddy," Michonne said. "Believe me, you're a very good daddy, and Hope's lucky to have you. Judith's lucky to have you for everything that you do for her. You're a very _good_ daddy, otherwise you wouldn't keep me up half the night worrying about something that she's already forgotten about."

Michonne knew that for Daryl there were two things that were most important to him, two things that he felt like he needed to make his life complete. The odd thing was that even though life had become bleak, and things were falling apart around them, the things that Daryl needed were still things that he could _have_, at least for a while.

Daryl needed to be a good husband, and to feel that he was a good husband. Michonne tried to reassure him as often as possible that he was the best husband she, or any woman for that matter, could hope to have. Daryl also needed to be a good father. Michonne also tried to reassure him frequently that he _was_ a good father. Hope spoke monuments to that. She obviously adored Daryl, and laughed and cooed and smiled at him whenever he was in her presence.

The more she thought about it, she didn't know if it was good or bad that Daryl's entire set of life goals boiled down to two things: being a good husband and being a good father. On the one hand, it was wonderful, since it meant that he actually had achieved, whether or not he believed it, both of these goals, but it was also sad because it really spoke monuments to her about his past. For Daryl those were the two biggest things in his life, but she really hated to think about all that he'd been through when, on the other hand, _not_ being that was his greatest fear.

Michonne knew that she didn't ever want to fully grasp the kind of animal that Daryl's father must have been, or even what kind of woman his mother must have been. The scars on his body were horrific enough on their own to tell the story, but knowing that Daryl seemed to think that if he wasn't a great father and a great husband, then he must be what his father _was_, and that was what he'd put all his energy into avoiding, told her that he must have suffered more than she could even imagine at the hands of the brute that he'd called a father. It even, when she thought about it, gave her reason to forgive Merle for the way that he'd been. They'd been shaped under the same terrible example, and really, she thought, neither of them had done a bad job at turning their lives around, all things considered. Merle had handled things in his own way, and Daryl in his.

"Daryl," Michonne said, "I love you, and Hope loves you, and if we have another baby, it will love you too."

When Daryl still didn't respond, Michonne wasn't sure what to say exactly. His breathing was anything but steady, so she knew he hadn't fallen asleep. He might even be crying, but in the darkness she couldn't tell and he was quiet if that were the case.

"You're a good daddy, Daryl, you're the best daddy that Hope could ask for, and you're not going to change," she urged.

"'Chonne," Daryl said after a minute, "you ever been sorry?"

That was a loaded question. She'd been sorry for a lot of things in her life, too many more things than she wanted to count.

"Sorry for what, Daryl?" Michonne asked.

Daryl was quiet for a minute before continuing, and when he did continue, Michonne thought his voice was different. She detected a certain sadness there, as though he'd already anticipated her reply.

"Sorry you kissed me in the watchtower, sorry you married me, sorry we got Hope…" Daryl said, his voice trailing off.

"The only thing I've been sorry about, Daryl, in regards to you is that I didn't kiss you that day we went out hunting, when I first thought about kissing you," Michonne said.

"You thought about kissing me that day?" Daryl asked, his voice changing again.

"I did," Michonne said.

Daryl snickered.

"What?" Michonne asked.

"Nothin' 'Chonne, I was just rememberin' that was the day I first saw you in them black lace panties that you got an' I couldn't get the damn things off my mind for days," Daryl said.

Michonne smiled.

"So you like black lace panties?" She asked.

"I didn't know I did, 'Chone, not 'til I saw you in 'em and then I was hooked," he replied.

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Carol wasn't sure what Michonne had been up to all day, but she'd disappeared with Hope right after breakfast, declaring that she had some things to take care of. Carol didn't usually question Michonne, she'd found it better to just let her do whatever it was that Michonne was going to do. By now she knew that Michonne was only going to explain herself if _she_ felt like it.

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That evening, Michonne had excused herself a little early, going upstairs and putting Hope to bed.

Daryl had hung around downstairs, chatting with Tyreese and Carol and making plans for the upcoming planting party that would take place.

He'd only gone upstairs, finally, when Carol said something about the unusually early bedtime that Michonne had excused herself for. Daryl started to get concerned, hoping that she was just tired and not that anything else was bothering her or that she wasn't feeling well. Finally he'd excused himself and went straight to the bedroom, hearing that all was quiet in the nursery.

When Daryl came into the bedroom, Michonne was in bed, the lamp lit, and she looked expectant.

"I thought you'd be asleep, you feelin' OK?" He asked, shucking his clothes and walking around to his side of the bed.

"It took you long enough to get up here," Michonne said, "and I'm feeling fine."

Just as he was getting into bed, she threw back the covers and got out, walking away from the bed, but still standing within the lamplight. She was wearing a dark pink lace teddy, and Daryl thought for a moment he might be dreaming.

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Michonne had searched a number of houses before coming up with anything that was lace, was her size, and was something she thought might catch Daryl's attention. The fact that he was just staring at her now, not saying anything, no real expression on her face, suddenly made her feel a little exposed and not as confident as she'd felt moments before, though she did her best to hide it.

"Well, aren't you going to say anything?" She asked. She'd never liked these kinds of clothes all that much. She'd always felt ridiculous wearing them, and she only wore them for the response they elicited. At this moment she wasn't getting much of a response from Daryl. "I know it's not black, but it's all that I could find," she added.

"I…I mean…you…you look…_amazing_," Daryl stammered.

Michonne smiled. His response was honest, and it was completely Daryl. Now she realized that his lack of response before was because he couldn't figure out how to respond.

Michonne crawled onto the bed, as slowly as possible and crawled over to him, pulling the cover off of him.

"Do I?" She asked.

"Mmm hmmm," Daryl responded, leaning toward her to kiss her.

She crawled forward, straddling him and kissed him, biting her lip as she pulled away and then moving down to suck at his neck. She felt him clumsily grabbing at her and she stifled a laugh. She was pretty sure that Daryl wasn't fully functioning at this moment, his hands were clumsy on her body, almost feverish with haste. She could also feel, against her inner thigh, that he'd gone hard immediately, and it turned her on more than she imagined it could.

"Do you want me to take it off?" She asked. "Or do you want to work around it?"

She waited a moment for a response, but there wasn't one, at least not a verbal one. Daryl found her mouth again and searched it with his tongue, his teeth clicking lightly on hers. His hands fumbled at her and she pulled away from his mouth, smiling.

She moved the garment around as best she could, the fit not being ideal, and slid herself down onto him. His face changing in a way that she hadn't seen, or hadn't noticed, in the past. Her mouth made contact with his again, as she tried to move herself to match his thrusts, not allowing him to flip her over, no matter how many times he made a move to do so. She was enjoying the battle mixed with the pleasure, and it didn't seem like it was deterring him at all either.

She felt her own pleasure building, and she knew she wasn't going to last much longer. The very sight of the pleasure he was getting from this was pushing her forward more than she'd imagined it would. As her own climax crashed down upon her, and she fell forward on him, she felt him grab her, pulling her against him as he too found his release.

"I love you," she panted, when she finally had enough breath to do so, still resting on top of him.

"I love you, too," he growled in her ear.


	59. Chapter 59

**AN: Slightly shorter chapter…there are others in the works. **

**Remember, feed the author's and review if you like what you read! **

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Daryl was holding Hope while Carol wrapped her to Michonne's back.

"Your child is slippery," Carol said, brushing Hope's leg with her hand.

"That's what happens when you tell Daryl to put sunscreen on her," Michonne said.

"You said to make sure she was good an' covered, and she's good an' covered," Daryl said.

"You did well, Daryl, no one is criticizing you," Michonne said.

"How does that feel?" Carol asked. "You can let go of Hope now, Daryl."

"You sure?" He asked.

"I'm certain, Daryl, she's not going anywhere," Carol said.

Daryl slowly let go of Hope and she settled into her place.

"Comfortable?" Carol asked. Michonne shifted around.

"Not quite, there's something over here that's not good," she said, motioning at her left side. Carol walked around and looked at it.

"Oh, it's just a little twisted," she said, fixing the place. "Better?"

"Much," Michonne responded.

Daryl handed Michonne the knife to buckle around her waist. She huffed a little when she took it, never really feeling comfortable leaving her katana behind, no matter how safe the situation was.

"It's just for a lil' bit, 'Chonne, and I'm keepin' y'all in the middle of everyone, ain't nothin' gon' happen no way," He said. He kissed her forehead while she buckled on the knife.

They were just going to get the planting done, it was unlikely that anything would happen, and even if it did, Michonne was more than capable of defending herself with a knife, it was just that she _preferred_ her katana. She knew, however, that it would be more comfortable to have Hope strapped to her back during the planting if she was going to spend the whole day bending over and stooping down.

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Michonne, Daryl, and Carol joined everyone else down at the "fields" to start planting. Everything was ready, but Rick and Tyreese were making a few more laps, turning over the dirt and making sure that all the designated areas were clearly marked and ready for planting. Carol had organized everything down to the finest detail, giving everyone their instructions and their locations. There wasn't anyone who wouldn't be involved in the planting and watering process today.

Maggie and Glenn were responsible for handing out seed bags. Michonne already knew where she was working, so she took her bag from them and started toward her area, Hope enjoying the ride, though she couldn't understand what they were doing.

Judith would not succumb to being restrained to a wrap, so Carl had accepted the job of entertaining her a little off from the fields, playing with her and a bright colored ball that he'd found.

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Michonne didn't know how many hours they'd all been working, some planting, some making rows for others, some going back and forth for water, filling watering cans, and lightly watering the already planted seeds, but her back was killing her and Hope was starting to demand something to eat. The rest of them had pretty much unanimously decided to work through lunch to make sure that everything got planted and watered before the end of the day, with the exception of Carol who had to stop to feed Judith, and would stop early to start getting dinner ready for everyone to close out the day.

Michonne wandered over to where Daryl was, Hope whimpering on her back.

"Daryl, she's hungry, I need help," Michonne said, coming up. She turned around and stood in front of him, waiting patiently while Daryl freed Hope from her constraints. He kissed the little girl, who was in no mood to deal with anyone that wasn't offering her something to eat the moment, and passed her quickly to Michonne, who was already freeing her breasts.

"You gettin' tired, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked, wiping the sweat off his forehead with the back of his arm. Michonne realized she was panting, and pouring sweat. The added body heat of Hope, coupled with the heat of the day, the heat of the sun, and the exertion from the work had made her almost soaking wet.

"Yeah, Daryl, I'm getting tired," she replied.

"Maybe you oughta take a break, or take a different job for a while," he said.

"I think I'm going to, Daryl, when Hope gets done. I think I'll see if I can get on water run duty," she responded.

"Just tell Carol you wanna do it and she'll put someone else to plantin', I bet some of them wanna different job too," he said.

When Hope finished eating, Michonne called Carol over to help her get Hope strapped to Daryl's back. She'd decided that it was safer for her to be inside the community with him than it would be for her to go outside the gates with Michonne.

"Can you pull someone from water duty and let me trade off with them?" Michonne asked.

"Yeah, I'll put Chelsea to work in your place," Carol said.

When Hope was secured to Daryl's back, apparently considering the possibility of a nap, Michonne kissed her and then gave Daryl a quick kiss.

"I'll be back later," she announced, heading off to get her katana from the house before joining up with Sasha and Beth to go out for water.

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Sasha and Michonne were flanking Beth on the water run.

Beth and Sasha had been becoming quite the bosom buddies, drawn together because of their semi-romances with Junior and Jimmy. Michonne didn't know how far those romances went, but she didn't imagine that they were blazing out of control. Sasha and Jimmy seemed a lot more sure of themselves than Beth and Junior, and it made Michonne wonder if the two of them were even really sure what to do with themselves. Both Beth and Junior seemed fairly innocent.

The romance between Sasha and Jimmy also had a lot more opportunity to grow these days since Tyreese had begun to occupy Carol's bed much more frequently than he did his own. Michonne hadn't missed him bringing a bag of his stuff to the house one night. She suspected he was slowly moving in, bringing a few items at a time so as to not alarm Carol, and then one day she would sort of realize that he had very little need to return to his house, all of his belongings having made the pilgrimage to Carol's room in installments.

"So, Sasha, how are things with Jimmy now that Carol has your brother occupied?" Michonne asked.

"Things are a lot better. We don't have him always breathing down our necks," Sasha said.

"They're over at our house most of the time until late, and then they both go home, but I think they're both going to the same home because Junior says Jimmy isn't in their room very often," Beth said.

"You wouldn't rat someone out, would you, Beth?" Sasha said.

"There's nothing to be ashamed of," Michonne said, "I certainly am in no position to judge anyone."

"I know, and I know Tyreese knows, it's just that he doesn't care right now. He's always been overprotective, and at least right now he's occupied with someone else to be protective of," Sasha said. "I've told Beth she should move in with us, then maybe she'd get a little alone time with Junior, but she hasn't done it yet."

"You haven't had _any_ alone time with Junior?" Michonne asked.

They reached the water and filled their buckets. There weren't many Walkers out there, most of them were drawn to the fences surrounding the community, interested in all the noise and commotion going on inside. That left the woods surrounding the area fairly clear.

"No," Beth said meekly as they turned back, "we haven't had any time with each other. Maggie and Glenn watch us like hawks. You'd think they were my parents. I mean it's not like I don't know what they're doing all the time."

Michonne snickered.

"Do you want me to have a little talk with them about letting you move in with Sasha? I'm pretty sure Tyreese is just going to end up living at our house. You two would have the house to yourselves," Michonne said. "You could have whatever guests you wanted."

"Are you setting up a hook up for Beth?" Sasha asked with a laugh.

"I'm simply putting an offer on the table," Michonne said. "Beth and Junior are both adults, I suppose they can make their own decisions. Besides, who do you think was behind setting your brother and Carol up, and consequently getting him out of your hair?"

"_You_ did that?" Sasha asked.

"Well, your brother did most of the work, but I suggested he take a chance," Michonne responded.

"Well, then I guess it would be alright if you talked to Maggie and Glenn," Beth said. Michonne smiled. Beth's face was a bright red. Michonne didn't know if they'd know what to do or have the guts to proceed when they were alone, but given enough time she was confident that they'd work up to things.

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It was dark when they finally finished watering all that they'd put down, and everyone headed back to headquarters, starving and exhausted, but somewhat exhilarated at the thought of the food that they were going to be growing soon.

Carol had everything ready when they got there, setting the kitchen up like an assembly line so that they could pass through, fill their plates, and file into the dining room, where most of them sank into their seats like stones in water.

"Good job out there, everyone, we hustled and we got it done," Carol said, finally allowing herself the luxury of taking a seat.

"Hear, hear!" Said Maggie, mustering up the last bit of enthusiasm she had for the evening.

It looked as though everyone in the room would likely go directly back to their houses and collapse into bed. There would be sweet dreams tonight because if everything went well they'd just secured themselves a good deal more time in the community.

Michonne, for one, was exhausted. She had managed to circulate through the various jobs available to them throughout the day, spending half the time with Hope either sleeping or squirming against her back. She could tell that Daryl was exhausted too, since he'd also done his fair share of the work, carrying their child around the other half of the time.

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"I'm gettin' too old for this shit," Daryl said, taking off his clothes and going in the bathroom to start washing. Michonne followed suit, thankful that the day's excitement had exhausted Hope as well.

"Yeah, you are pretty old," she said, smirking at him. She knew that Daryl had been joking, and his facial expression right now told her that he was trying to decide if she was joking. "I'm pretty old, too, you know," she said, reassuring him that she was joking.

He grinned at her.

"Nah, you ain't old, 'Chonne, you still a spring chicken," he said.

"Well, tonight there's not a lot of strut left in this chicken, Daryl," she said.

"I know what'cha mean, 'Chonne, but we got everythin' ready to go. We gon' grow us a whole messa food out there," Daryl responded, quietly helping her wash her back. She responded in kind.

When they finally got in bed, Michonne felt herself engulfed in sleep almost immediately. She was so exhausted that it felt like the bed was moving around with her on it. The very last thing she felt was Daryl putting his arm around her. She was gone before he ever started snoring.


	60. Chapter 60

Absolutely no one protested when Carol sent them down to water the fields. Tending anything growing there was of the upmost importance to anyone, and it was almost deemed an honor to get sent down with a wheelbarrow full of buckets of water and watering can. Even if your job took you hours to do, it seemed at the moment to be the most important job that you could be entrusted with.

Other people continued with demolition, and Maggie and Glenn continued to select carefully their run partners, hitting towns up that were in the area.

Anyone feeling useless could go on an almost constant stream of water runs or could choose to run cars outside the gates and siphon off gas. There was certainly no shortage of work to be done, and that didn't even touch on the multiple jobs that Carol carried off by herself.

"Ok," Maggie said at breakfast, "we're going to hit up this other little town that Michonne told us about today, so we'll need backup. If we take both trucks we can clear out a lot more."

Maggie had become a strategist, even suggesting that once they'd cleaned out the stores they could start a sort of "door to door" project like they had done within the community, arguing that people stockpiled so much stuff they could easily drag another year of easy living out of raiding their homes. Daryl hadn't completely signed off on the project, still wanting to see what they got from just the basic raids, realizing that a door to door type sweep of a town would take a long time, and made whoever was doing it more vulnerable in the meantime.

It was warming up, and the Walkers were starting to swarm a little, apparently stirred by the lack of chilled temperatures. It was riskier now whenever you were outside the gates.

"Do you want in, Michonne?" Maggie asked.

"Yeah, I'll go," Michonne offered.

"No you won't," Carol said. Michonne looked at her. "And you won't make that face at me either," Carol added.

Maggie looked at Michonne and Michonne shrugged a little.

"I don't know if you haven't noticed it, Michonne, but you're not entirely yourself," Carol said. "You've been tired lately, and you've been acting a little differently." She directed her conversation then at Maggie, "While you're out, I'm going to need you to see if you can get me some pregnancy tests at the drug store."

"No problem," Maggie said, looking back at Michonne.

"Carol, I don't think…" Michonne started.

Carol cut her off and Michonne looked surprised.

"I know you haven't had your period since we started with this birth control, most of us haven't, and I've been waiting on morning sickness to let me know, but I know that's no guarantee since you told me you didn't get sick before Hope. I was hoping that having Daryl's kids was what made you sick, but I know that I can't rely on that," Carol continued.

Carol looked around at the group, most of which had frozen for a moment. She thought about it.

"That didn't come out the way that I wanted it to come out," she corrected. "Still, you're not going on any runs until you can produce a negative pregnancy test for me and we don't have any for you to try."

They had found a rather large stash of birth control pills and the like while going through the houses, and Carol had squirreled away any contraceptives she came upon, but there weren't any pregnancy tests, at least not in the boxes that people had brought to her in storage. Apparently most of the people in this community had believed greatly in family planning, and none of them had been in the stages of planning more family.

Michonne looked around, slightly embarrassed. Everyone was looking at her and she felt like she was in one of those dreams where you're supposed to give a speech or do something really big and you suddenly realize that you're naked and everyone is staring you. Except she wasn't asleep, and she wasn't naked. Still, everyone was staring at her now. Carol had just told them she hadn't had her period in a while, and had added to that gem the fact that she thought she might be pregnant.

"Well, I officially feel like I can come to meals naked," Michonne said, snickering at all the faces looking at her. "I have not one ounce of privacy left."

Carol blushed, and Michonne didn't miss it.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to say _all_ of that, I only meant to say that you're not going out on runs until I know that you can go out on them safely," Carol said.

Michonne went back to her breakfast, not looking up again.

"It's OK, Carol, I'm not mad. Everyone, please stop staring at me, it's making these powdered eggs less appealing than they have to be," she said.

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"You think you might be pregnant, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked, following Michonne as she went around to collect ration boxes for Carol, a job that Carol had deemed suitable for her in case she were pregnant.

"I don't know, Daryl, that's the problem. We'll have to wait until they get back with the tests," she said.

"You knowed last time," he said.

"No, I didn't," Michonne corrected. "I thought I got food poisoning from something I ate, it was Carol who let me know that it wasn't food poisoning. If I am pregnant, then I'm not sick yet, but I don't know if that means I'll get sick or I won't. It's hard to tell."

"But do you think you might be?" Daryl asked.

Michonne was getting annoyed. Daryl was following her around asking her questions she didn't have answers to while she was doing a job she didn't really want to be doing.

"Daryl, isn't there something that you could be doing right now besides tailing me?" She barked. "Can't you go check out the fields or help in demolition or _anything?"_

Daryl backed up a little, losing step with Michonne. He decided, all things considering, that maybe it wasn't best to annoy her right now and she was clearly annoyed.

"Sorry, 'Chonne," he said. "I guess I'ma go do demolition work. I'll see ya later." He turned, reluctantly, and started in the opposite direction.

Michonne watched him walking away like a dog with his tail between his legs and she felt bad for snapping at him.

"Daryl!" She called.

He stopped and turned around to face her.

"Come here," she said.

Daryl came back, with the same general nature that he'd walked away with.

"What is it, 'Chonne?" He asked.

"I'm sorry," she said. She reached out the one hand not holding the box she was carrying and pulled him forward until she could kiss him. When she broke loose she looked at him, half smiling. "I guess I just need my space right now. I love you," she offered.

"I love you too, 'Chonne," he said.

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"Do you think that anyone has had the talk with Beth and Junior?" Michonne asked while filling ration boxes with Carol in the storage house.

"Soap?" Carol asked.

"Two bars," Michonne said, checking the lists out of the boxes around her. Carol handed her two bars of soap and she dropped them into their respective boxes.

"What do you mean, the talk?" Carol asked. "I would think living in the prison was enough talk for anyone. I doubt Rick even has to have that conversation with Carl now."

"Well I mean I'm sure they know what sex is, and certainly they know a wide variety of sounds it can produce, but I mean more about the mechanics of it. You said you were surprised on your honeymoon, and I know I didn't quite know what to expect the first time," Michonne said.

"Well, I suppose, like everyone else, if they don't know now, they'll figure it out," Carol said. "Do you want to tell them the mechanics of it, because I certainly don't want to?"

Michonne laughed. "No, I don't really want to either. I _do_ want to talk to Maggie and Glenn about Beth, though, and I've been meaning to do so. She wants to move in with Sasha for a little more breathing room."

There was no secret now that Tyreese had moved into their house. He was there every night, and he was there every morning. His laundry went into their laundry basket, and his ration box went right alongside theirs. No one had said anything about it, but no one was pretending it was any kind of top secret information either.

"I think that they'll be fine with that, you've just got to remind them both that neither of them had anyone standing in their way, at least not really, and that Beth and Junior are old enough to make their own decisions," Carol said. "Toothpaste?"

Michonne checked her list. "Four tubes," she said.

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"Why we gotta wait 'til mornin'?" Daryl asked, crawling in bed. It was eating him alive to know if Michonne was pregnant, but she seemed so nonchalant about it.

"Because, if I'm pregnant, then I'm barely pregnant, and it will show up better on the test in the morning. That's just how these things work, Daryl," she said, getting in bed.

Daryl was excited and nervous all at the same time. He wanted to know desperately and he couldn't really figure out how the tests could tell time. How did they know if it was morning or night when she did it? He really wanted an answer then, but she'd been adamant about the fact that it wouldn't show up correctly unless she waited until morning. Daryl didn't feel like he could sleep, and it didn't help that it was obvious that was all Michonne felt like doing at the moment.

Daryl wrapped his arm around her, trying to be satisfied with just holding her. He didn't want to ask her anymore questions. She'd been pretty touchy about the whole thing and he didn't know if it was hormones like Hershel had said it was when she was touchy and pregnant with Hope or that she just wasn't in the mood to answer questions.

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Michonne sat for a while glaring at the lines that glared back at her. She was trying very hard to decide how she felt in that moment and all she'd come up with was that she couldn't answer that question with any distinct answer.

She had to show it Daryl, and she had to show it to Carol

Carol was up, preparing breakfast for the crowd that would soon be rising and shuffling toward headquarters with expectations of a hot meal and their assignments for the day. Daryl was sleeping, having hardly noticed at all her slipping out from under his arm to come down. She knew he'd been up most of the night, anticipating this moment, and she decided he should be the first to see the lines that were mocking her at the moment.

He'd be excited, as excited as part of her wanted to be, without giving much thought to the part of her that was terrified.

Michonne came into the bedroom and sat down on the bed next to Daryl. He was sleeping peacefully and she hated to wake him, but part of her thought that he'd forgive her if she did.

"Daryl," she called out softly. "Daryl, wake up," she said, pushing at his shoulder but not raising her voice much, not yet ready to rally Judith and Hope.

"What? What is it?" Daryl asked, stirring slightly and barely opening his eyes.

Michonne thrust the test she was holding toward him, and he woke enough to take it, staring at it blankly.

"What is it? What does it mean?" He asked, slowly coming into focus and fully realizing it was Michonne who sat next to him.

"It's a pregnancy test," she said softly, "and it means that I hope you really do want to be a father again."

It took Daryl a few minutes to come to his senses and process what she was saying. He looked at her with a confused look on his face that she knew was most likely caused by her disrupting his slumber.

"You mean?" He said.

"I mean that it looks like we're doing this, so I hope you meant what you said about wanting to welcome another one," Michonne said.

Daryl looked dazed for another minute before his eyes fully opened.

"We gon' have us another baby?" He asked finally.

"Yeah, Daryl, it looks like it," Michonne said.

Daryl finally woke up and sat up, grabbing her and pulling her on top of him to kiss her.

"We gon' have us another baby!" He exclaimed.

Michonne grinned at him. He wasn't fully awake, but he was already excited.

"I've got to go tell Carol, you get dressed," she urged. "Can you bring the girls when you come?" She asked, prying the test out of his hands.

"Yeah, 'Chonne, I got it," he said. He grinned again. "We gon' have us another baby!"

Michonne smiled back at him, the happiness was contagious, even if didn't completely hush the worried voice in her head.

"Yeah, Daryl, we are," she said. "Get dressed and come to breakfast," she commanded.

She got up and started out the room, heading to tell Carol the news.

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Carol was less excited than Daryl was, but she smiled nonetheless.

"Congratulations," she said. "How do you feel?"

"Well Daryl is tickled," Michonne said.

"But how do you feel?" Carol asked.

"I don't know, I guess part of me is excited, but the other part is terrified," Michonne said.

"I wouldn't feel alright about it if it were any different," Carol offered. "At least the terrified part of you will keep you in check."

Carol got up from where she was sitting while she kept an eye on breakfast and embraced Michonne in a hug.

"Come on, I guess I need to get breakfast on the table and you've got some announcing to do," Carol said.

"I guess you're right, but I'm going to wait for Daryl," Michonne said.

"I wouldn't expect any different," Carol said. She heaved up one of the pots. "Oh, and Michonne?"

"Yeah?" Michonne said, walking beside Carol but knowing better than to offer to take a pot.

"You're my baby now," Carol said, "up until this baby comes."

Michonne smiled at her.

"I know, I remember the deal," Michonne said.


	61. Chapter 61

Michonne had done her best to hide the way she felt from everyone. She felt terrible. She was exhausted and more than a little sorry each time she lost her breakfast before it had even begun to handle the gnawing that was in her stomach.

Still, Daryl looked at her with excitement, and she didn't want to ruin that. The rest of the group looked at her with something akin to anxiety, and she didn't want to heighten that. It was only Carol that looked at her from time to time like she had magically developed the ability to read her mind.

"Are you OK, Michonne?" Carol asked when they were filling boxes. "If you want to go lie down, there are plenty of people that could help me," she urged.

Michonne did want to lie down, on the one hand, but on the other she felt like she needed to keep working, at least in some small way, so that she didn't let the others down.

"I'm fine," she stammered, reaching down and picking up one of the boxes that Carol had designated for her as one of the lightest. As she stood, she was dizzied and her field of vision was lessened. For a moment she saw everything, and heard everything as distanced, like the scrambled channel on televisions when she was younger.

Michonne dropped to her knees, involuntarily, and felt the sharp ache of doing so, just before blackness engulfed her.

Carol had seen it coming, and was glad she had. She got there in time to catch Michonne by the shoulder and ease her down so that she didn't collapse with the force she was threatening to go down with. Carol carefully rolled her over, the sounds having drawn attention from Beth, Maggie, and Rachel who were in and out helping them.

"Is she OK, what happened?" Maggie asked, standing in the doorway with her hand halfway over her mouth.

"It's fine, Maggie," Carol said. "I want you to get a can of chicken noodle soup and go get that heating up." Maggie went directly to the shelves to look for the soup. Michonne was starting to come around and Carol smiled at her, rubbing her forehead a little. "Beth, go in the fruit boxes and find me some fruit cocktail, if you can find some in syrup, that's what I really want. Rachel, can you go get Daryl for me?"

The other two women went to their posts.

"What happened?" Michonne asked, starting to sit up. Carol pushed her back down.

"Not yet, just stay down for a few minutes," Carol said. "You blacked out, but I don't think it's a big deal. I used to do that sometimes when I was pregnant with Sophia. Are you hungry, Michonne?"

Michonne's head was fuzzy, but Carol was perfectly calm, so she didn't feel like she should be too concerned.

"Yeah, I am," Michonne said.

"I thought you might be, Maggie is making you some soup," Carol said.

Beth returned carrying a small can. She handed it to Carol. Michonne looked at her. Carol looked calm, but Beth looked terrified.

Carol pulled open the pop top on the can quickly.

"OK, let's sit up a little bit," she said, moving to help Michonne. "Beth, do you think that you can sit behind her and help me support her for just a few minutes, until she gets her sea legs back?"

Beth didn't say anything, but she did kneel behind Michonne.

"I feel a little light headed," Michonne said.

"Drink the juice," Carol said, handing the can to Michonne.

"Seriously? The syrup?" Michonne asked. She had always liked sweet things, but the syrup from fruit cocktail was its own level of sweetness.

"Yeah, when you were just lying on the floor unconscious, I don't kid," Carol said. "I know it's a little gross, but it's going to make you feel a lot better."

Michonne somewhat reluctantly drank some of the juice, taking a momentary break before continuing. They seldom got sweet things these days, and this was a little overpowering.

Daryl came into the door and immediately didn't know what to do. Michonne was sitting on the floor, leaning against Beth, and Carol was on her knees next to her, hovering over her.

"What's goin' on?" He asked, walking over.

"Everything's fine, Daryl, no need to panic," Carol said. She got up. "Keep drinking that, I'll be right back." Carol walked to Daryl and caught him by the arm. "Can I talk to you a minute?"

"You OK, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked before he turned to follow Carol.

"I'm fine, Daryl," Michonne said, sipping some more of the juice.

Daryl followed Carol outside and stood in front of her in the street.

"What is it? What's wrong?" Daryl asked. Carol wasn't wearing the same facial expression that she had in the house. In the house she had looked completely calm, even a little pleased. Now her forehead was wrinkled and she looked concerned.

"Nothing's wrong right now, Daryl," Carol said, "Michonne just passed out."

Daryl looked worried, but he didn't say anything. Carol knew that he was waiting patiently for her to tell him out to fix this, what he was supposed to be doing.

"I guess it was my wakeup call that she's got to eat more, and she's got to eat better. She's trying to feed Hope, take care of herself, and give the baby what it needs, and that means she's got to really take care to eat enough and to eat well," Carol said. "I need you to go hunting, Daryl. I don't care if you bring back enough for everyone or just enough for Michonne. Most of us can get by OK without a lot of protein, but I really want to get some good food in her, can you get me some meat?"

"I'll get it, Carol," Daryl said. "I promise I'll get it."

Carol smiled at him and squeezed his upper arm.

"I know you will, Daryl. Take some of the others with you, set them up fishing in the creek. I know we've seen some fish down there, and probably if they go farther up they'll find even more since it seems to get bigger," Carol said. "They can find some fishing poles over behind headquarters, I had Tyreese put some back there for when we needed it."

"Ain't no problem, Carol," Daryl said. "You just take care of 'Chonne until I can get back, OK?"

"Don't worry, Daryl, I have it covered," Carol said.

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"What are you doing?" Tyreese asked, walking up behind Daryl who was almost frantically building wire into box shapes.

"Makin' rabbit traps," Daryl said.

"Why?" Tyreese asked.

"Carol said Michonne needs meat, and she looks worried. When Carol looks worried, I get worried," Daryl said. "So I'm goin' huntin' an' I'm gonna get some rabbits while I'm out there."

"Why don't you just shoot them?" Tyreese asked.

"Ain't my plan," Daryl said. "Rachel said they was a bunch of rabbits that lived down around the creek. I'm gonna trap 'em an' bring 'em back here and the long eared little fuckers are gonna make us more rabbits, that way if I can't find nothin' when I go out huntin', I'll know we always got somethin' here to eat."

Tyreese chuckled. "They're going to be awfully inbred after a bit," he said.

"Don't reckon it matters if the little fuckers are smart, they'll eat the same," Daryl said.

"It's a good idea, Daryl," Tyreese said, "if it'll work."

"It'll work," Daryl said. "I need you to do somethin' for me while I'm gone."

"What's that?" Tyreese asked.

"I need you to make me a pen for the rabbits, an' you gotta send Maggie and Glenn out to find one of them feed stores. Tell 'em to get every damn type of food they got there. I don't know what the fuckers eat, but they'll find somethin' they like when they get hungry enough," Daryl said. He finished shaping the last of the six traps that he had made and stood up, collecting up his traps on the rope he'd been threading through them. He slung them over his shoulder.

"I can do that, man," Tyreese said. "Be careful out there."

"I will be, I gotta come back," Daryl said, smiling. "'Chonne's countin' on me and she'd be pissed if I didn't come back. I'm gonna take some of them boys that are still wet behind the ears and put 'em to work fishin' too. It's time to start testin' out them fine smokehouses you built."

Tyreese smiled at Daryl and chuckled a little. "Good luck, see you later," he said, heading off to find Glenn and Maggie.

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Daryl had led Jimmy, Junior, and Carl further up the creek where it widened a good deal.

"Alright, I'm gonna go huntin', but I'll be back for y'all before dark," Daryl said. "Y'all keep your eyes out for Walkers, and keep the kid between you," he said, gesturing to Carl.

"I'm not a kid, Daryl," Carl said, a little annoyed.

Daryl smiled a little at him. "I think you're all kids, kid," Daryl said.

Carl looked unhappy with him.

"Tell ya what, kid, you get me a string of fish and I won't think of you as such a kid no more, deal?" Daryl asked, ruffling Carl's hair.

Carl smiled. "Deal," he said.

"Y'all keep an ear out," Daryl said. "I'll whistle a couple a' times when I got somethin' good and y'all better hustle down to where we get water. I ain't leavin' meat out for a long time in case some Walkers decide to come along."

"We'll be listenin'," Junior said.

Daryl left the three of them digging around for worms and getting ready to settle down to fish. He didn't know what they would catch, but anything was better than nothing.

He wandered around, looking for rabbit tracks and finally found what he'd been looking for, including he saw one of the long eared creatures shuffling around in the brush.

_There's a whole damn den of 'em 'round here._ Daryl thought. He took a while to strategically place his traps and then left, if he caught something, the cage would keep the Walkers in the area from getting to it.

Daryl killed a few Walkers as he was wondering, looking for some kind of track of something that he could take back for dinner. He cursed quietly at them. The damn Walkers made hunting a pain in the ass. By now he'd have been able to acquire quite a bit of food if it was back before this whole thing happened. Now he had the added challenge of dealing with those nasty bastards either getting to what he wanted first or rustling around making so much noise that they ran everything off.

Daryl was determined though, and he was going to keep his promise to Carol. He _would_ bring back some meat to eat, no matter what it was that he had to shoot.

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Daryl had been stalking the deer for a little while before he finally got a clear view of him. He was a nice sized deer and he'd feed them well. Daryl was also a little thankful that he wasn't too far from where he'd set his traps. He'd need the boys to help him carry the deer back to the community, especially if he got rabbits too to lug back.

When he took the deer down, he was pleased with himself. The deer was more than he'd honestly hoped for coming out there. They still had enough time to get back before dark, too, even with their load.

Daryl whistled and covered the deer as best he could with some of the underbrush, hoping to disguise it a little until he could get back to it. He checked the area and it was clear from Walkers, at least for the moment.

He whistled again and heard a whistle answer him. The boys were coming.

As Daryl got closer to his traps, there was a man stooped down, bent over one of the traps. Daryl could immediately tell it wasn't a Walker, that wasn't the normal stance of a Walker.

"You better back the fuck away from my rabbits," Daryl growled, raising his crossbow.

The man stooped put his hands up, but hadn't turned yet.

"Don't shoot me," the man said, stuttering a little.

Finally he slowly turned around and stood up and Daryl realized it was a young man, he was maybe twenty-five. The boy, as Daryl now thought of him, stood up. He was a little taller than Daryl, and thin, but not starved. He looked like he hadn't grown into his arms and legs yet, so his overall appearance was gangly and awkward.

"What the hell you doin' fuckin' with my rabbits?" Daryl asked, not lowering the crossbow.

"Listen," the boy said, a half smile on his face, "I didn't mean no harm. You got five here, can't you spare one?"

"No, I can't," Daryl said.

"Man, don't be greedy. I saw that deer you got, you can't eat that deer and all five of these rabbits. I've been out here all day and all I got was three squirrels, I'm sick of eating squirrels," the boy protested.

"I can't spare no damn rabbit, this meat's for my family," Daryl said.

"How big is your family?" The boy asked. Daryl didn't say anything, it was obvious that he wasn't going to answer.

"Come on, man, I'll trade you. Three squirrels for one rabbit," he said, holding up the string of squirrels that he had.

Daryl eyed the boy. He had absentmindedly lowered his crossbow, realizing that the boy meant absolutely no harm at all.

"Come on, I'm sick of eatin' squirrel an' you got more than enough for your family," the boy continued. "You could spare one rabbit for three squirrels."

"Ain't my damn problem you can't hunt no better than you can," Daryl said. "You ain't gettin' one of them damn rabbits, they are for my wife," Daryl said. He could hear the rustling of the leaves and knew that the boys would be joining him soon.

"What kinda wife you got that can eat five rabbits?" The boy asked.

"My wife's pregnant, and she needs meat, we ain't eatin' the rabbits right now," Daryl said.

He felt sorry for the boy, it was obvious that the boy really wanted to trade for something different to eat, but he wasn't willing to give up any of the rabbits.

"You alone?" Daryl asked.

The boy smiled a little and looked around him.

"Why? Do _you _see anyone else?" He asked.

"Oh, a smart ass," Daryl barked. "I mean do you gotta group 'round here?"

"No, I ain't got no group. I come here from North Carolina. I left with my uncle and two brothers, but since my uncle didn't make it outta North Carolina, and my brother's both got killed when we was stayin' a spell in South Carolina, I reckon I'm all I got left," he said, "and these three squirrels," he added after a second. "So how 'bout that rabbit?"

"Damn it, I done said you ain't gettin' one 'a those damn rabbits, boy!" Daryl growled. "What's your name, kid?"

"Beau," the boy said.

Beau heard a stick crack behind him and saw three others approaching, two men probably about his age, and one younger boy. They were carrying poles and had ropes with some fish draped around their necks. None of them said anything.

"That your real name?" Daryl asked.

"Yeah," Beau said.

"What kind of a name is Beau?" Daryl asked.

"What's your name?" Beau asked.

"Daryl," Daryl responded.

"What kind of a name is Daryl?" Beau countered.

"Asshole," Daryl said, quietly.

Beau smiled at him again. "What about them fish? I could trade you these three squirrels for two decent fish," Beau said.

"Man, shut up. You can come with me, I reckon that Carol can cook up enough to feed one more mouth for the night," Daryl said. "And gimme them damn squirrles," he added as an afterthought, snatching the string of squirrels from Beau. Beau flashed him a broad grin.

"We got us a deer over there," Daryl said, addressing Jimmy and Junior now. I got to get the rabbit traps. Beau can prob'ly show you where the deer is and y'all can haul it back."

"Come on," Beau said, skipping formal introductions and showing the others where the deer was. He reckoned that these were Daryl's kids and Carol must be Daryl's pregnant wife. Beau shook his head a little. It looked like Carol had probably been at this baby makin' thing for a while, since the oldest of the three following him probably wasn't too much younger than he was.

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As soon as Daryl had left good and Tyreese had sent Maggie and Glenn on their way, Carol asked him to help Michonne to the house.

Michonne protested his assistance, insisting that she felt much better now, but Carol told him to walk with his arm around her in case she should decide to black out again. His job was to make sure that she didn't hit the ground, and he didn't have to wonder if she was in a good mood about it.

"You know I'm not going to ignore a direct order from Carol," Tyreese said, walking with her toward the house. "It's nothing personal."

"Whipped!" Michonne said.

Tyreese smiled.

"You're a fine one to be talking about what a woman can make a man do," he said. "Last accounts I had your husband's trying to become a rabbit farmer."

Michonne had no idea what Tyreese was talking about. She wasn't really mad at Tyreese for following Carol's orders and helping her, but she didn't like the idea of everyone looking at her like she was weak. Now they'd be looking at her like she didn't even possess the ability to cross the street without assistance, and that wasn't how she wanted anyone thinking about her.

"You know, sometimes we do what we do out of love, not out of being whipped," Tyreese continued, "but I'll forgive you for your snarly attitude. I know my wife was vicious when she was pregnant."

Michonne growled at him. "And now everything I say or do is going to be hormones, right?"

Tyreese chuckled, but didn't respond. He helped her to the couch.

"You want anything? Extra pillows, blanket?" He asked.

"I'm good," she said.

"If you want it, you better ask for it. Carol's on her way over and you don't want her to catch you wandering around. She's serious about putting you in your place right now," he said, laughing a little at Michonne's pouty face.

_Boy Daryl's got him a handful!_ He thought. She looked like she could burn holes through him with her eyes right now.

"I said I'm good," Michonne said, turning over on the couch to face the back of it.

Tyreese chuckled again and left the house, almost running onto Carol carrying a pot.

"Need help?" He asked.

"No, it's not heavy, it's just a can of soup," she said. "Did you get her settled?"

"Your patient is as settled as she's going to be. She's in one fine mood right now," Tyreese said, smiling.

Carol smiled back at him.

"I can handle Michonne's moods. I've gotten used to it. I think I'm actually immune to her glaring," Carol said. "That's a good thing because I've probably got at least seven more months of dealing with it."

Tyreese patted her on the shoulder and then started down the steps. Carol stepped inside and fixed a mug of soup, bringing it to Michonne and sitting the pot down on the floor next to her.

"You brought a whole pot of soup?" Michonne asked, rolling over and accepting the mug from Carol.

"Yes I did, and you're going to eat all of it," Carol said. "I don't know how many calories you're burning a day just by trying to keep everyone going in your little triangle, but I'm going to put all of them back in with interest."

Michonne snickered at her. She wanted to be mad, but Carol seemed to be in a really good mood right now, and it was a little contagious.

"It would also help if you would quit deciding to be such a harsh critic of my cooking," Carol said. "I mean I know that not much of what we have around here qualifies as delicious, but it's not bad enough that you need to be running off behind the house every day."

"Believe me," Michonne said, "it's not my choice."

"Well then, tell the baby to stop being such a harsh critic," Carol said.

Michonne smiled and drank some more of her soup.

"Good?" Carol asked.

"Actually, it is," Michonne said.

"Good," Carol said. "Listen, from now on, if you're hungry, you let me know. I don't care if you're eating every half hour, but I don't want you skimping on food if you get hungry."

Michonne thought it was a strange concept. She hadn't paid much attention to it at the prison, even though she knew that she ate four or five times a day when she was pregnant with Hope. She hadn't thought of it, there was just always Hershel or Carol pushing food at her all the time. Since they'd been here and had been working on setting up the community and figuring out how much supplies they had to sustain them, they'd all taken to eating less. Sometimes it was because they didn't want to stop working, other times it was because they were hoping to stretch supplies. Feeling at least a little hungry was a pretty common sensation. Now she knew that Carol was right, she was going to have to eat more if she wanted to keep up her health, keep feeding Hope, and make sure this baby got all that it needed.

"I will, Carol, but I really don't think I can finish this whole pot of soup right now, I'm getting full," Michonne said.

"Then I'll keep it for you and heat it up for you when you're ready for more," Carol said. "I think you need to take a nap. Sasha's got Hope over at headquarters, so you can rest a while. When you wake up you can come down there."

"OK, mom," Michonne said, smiling. She was tired, so she did welcome the prospect of at least a short nap now that she was full.

"Do you want another pillow or anything before I go?" Carol asked, getting up.

"No, I'm fine." Michonne said, closing her eyes.

Carol took the pot and slipped out the door.

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"Daryl's coming!" Stella called. She and Dominique swung open the gates and started killing the Walkers that were hovering around.

Carol stopped what she was doing and turned to watch the group coming through the gates. Daryl was weighed down a bunch of metal contraptions. She wasn't sure exactly what was going on there. Behind him came Carl, carrying what looked like a decent amount of fish, and behind him were Jimmy, Junior, and some new boy lugging a very large deer.

Carol beamed. When you sent Daryl out to do a job, he got that job done, and he did it big. She started toward him as he was peeling off the contraptions he had tied to himself.

"I ask you to bring me meat and you bring me another mouth to feed?" She scolded. Daryl could see that she was teasing, her face didn't have a bit of annoyance in it.

"How's 'Chonne?" He asked.

"She's doing just fine, Daryl, no worries. She's inside feeding Hope right now, but she'll be out here to see all this before you know it," Carol said. Daryl smiled at her.

"Did your man get my pen built?" He asked.

"What are you talking about, Daryl?" Carol asked. Tyreese hadn't told her about the rabbits or the pen that he'd been busy fashioning in the backyard behind headquarters.

"Tyreese knows what I'm talkin' 'bout," Daryl said. "We gon' grow us our own meat. I got us five rabbits to start with an' I'ma get us some more just as soon as I can."

Beau watched the scene in front of him. He was starting to wonder about Daryl's family now. He figured the woman that Daryl was talking to was Carol, and if she was pregnant, she probably could stand to eat a couple of rabbits, she was pretty twig thin. He still didn't know anything about the guys that were helping him carry the deer, or the youngest boy, but he was certain that the two people who opened the gate for him were _not_ part of Daryl's family.

"What'chu wanna do with the deer?" Beau called.

Having shed the cages, and leaving Carol to admire the rabbits through the wire, he turned back toward the four boys behind him.

"Any of y'all know how to butcher a deer?" He asked. Jimmy and Junior shook their heads.

"I do," Beau said. "I can also clean them rabbits like they had zippers."

"We ain't eatin' the fuckin' rabbits tonight, tonight we're eatin' some of that deer," Daryl said, "but you can help me clean it. I reckon if you gon' eat supper here you might as well earn it."

Carol walked over to join Daryl and sized up the boy in front of her. He was tall and skinny, with dirty blonde hair and a baby face. He smiled at her, a crooked smile, and nodded his head, his hands being full.

"How do, ma'am?" He said. "I'm Beau."

"Nice to meet you, Beau, I'm Carol," she responded.

"I figured as much," Beau said. "Daryl said you'd be willin' to let me get a mouthful outta your supper."

"I'm sure we'll have plenty," Carol said, already planning out the meal in her mind.

Michonne came out of headquarters carrying Hope, curious to see what was taking place outside. Tyreese had also started through the yard, wondering if Daryl had actually brought back any rabbits for the pen that he'd built.

Beau watched the two newest people approaching. By now Beau and the others had put the deer down, content to let it lie there until they'd been given further instruction. Beau wiped his hands awkwardly on his dirty pants.

"I could wash your clothes for you," Carol said. "We've got plenty around here, I'm sure we could find you some to wear in the meantime."

"That would be right nice 'a ya," Beau said, "but if it's all the same to you I reckon I'll wear these 'til we finish cleanin' whatever we're gon' clean today, 'cause I wouldn't wanna go gettin' no one else's clothes dirty."

"That's fine. I can warm you up some water to take a bath afterwards too, it looks like you haven't had a bath in a while," Carol said.

"I wash off in the creek every now and again," Beau said. "It's been right cold lately, so I don't do it 'less I really need to. It don't matter none, and the Nasties don't seem to pay me too much attention if I don't rinse off too often."

Carol could smell the boy from where she was standing, and he did have a stench that was comparable to that of a Walker. She hoped Michonne didn't get too close to him, that could very well make her sick and Carol didn't want her throwing up everything that she'd force fed her throughout the day.

"Well, you can get cleaned up here, after you've helped Daryl," Carol said with a smile.

Michonne approached and Daryl leaned over to kiss her.

"I stink and I'm dirty," he said, not daring to touch her with anything but his lips at the moment.

"I know, I can smell all of you," Michonne said.

"How you feelin'?" Daryl asked.

"I'm fine, Daryl," Michonne said, smiling.

Beau looked confused and scratched his head. The woman with baby had just very openly kissed Daryl, right in front of Carol.

"Um, I don't mean to be nosy, but…" Beau started.

"Then don't be," Daryl interjected.

"Daryl, be nice!" Carol said. "What's wrong, Beau?"

"Well, ain't you his woman?" Beau asked, wrinkling his forehead.

"No," Carol said smiling, "I'm not his _woman._"

"She's _my_ woman," Tyreese said, chuckling. Carol hadn't realized that he'd come up behind her until she felt him put his hands on her shoulders. She smiled, feeling him squeeze her shoulders.

"So who's your family?" Beau asked.

"We're all family, here," Michonne said. She smiled at the boy. He was cute. "I'm Michonne," she said, "and Carol's _man_ is Tyreese. This," she nodded toward Hope, "is Hope."

"Nice ta meet ya," Beau said.

"Alright, let's get goin' with this food, I could use some supper," Daryl said.

He tried to figure out what would be best. Cleaning the animals was going to be messy work, and he'd rather do it outside the community, but that would draw every Walker for a hundred miles. They'd already killed their fair share just trying to make their way back to the gates.

"Beau, you an' me are gonna go clean that deer on one of the other streets," he said. "Junior, Jimmy, can y'all at least clean fish?"

Both nodded.

"Alright then, y'all gon' go over to the other street and get to cleanin' them fish. I'll get the squirrels after we get the deer done. Tyreese, do you reckon you can put them rabbits in their pen and then bring me somethin' I can put the deer meat in for Carol?" Daryl asked.

"I think I could handle that," Tyreese said.

"I'll go find something," Carol said.

"Carl," Daryl said, "you can come with me an' Beau here," Daryl said.

"But I don't know how to butcher a deer," Carl said.

"You don't wanna be no kid no more, you gotta start gettin' more skills. You done shown me you can catch me a mess a' fish, now I reckon it's time for you to start learnin' how to butcher a deer," Daryl responded. Carl smiled.

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Carol had gone to work preparing bath water as soon as they'd gone around to start cleaning things. Tyreese put the rabbits in their pen and offered them some of the food that Maggie and Glenn had brought back, along with some of the water. Then he took the buckets that Carol had given him and started off to find Daryl and get the meat from him that Carol would either cook or they'd start putting in the smoke houses.

When Daryl and the others brought the meat around, Daryl asked Carol what she wanted to cook.

"I'ma go out tomorrow and get some more, but what you want for right now?" He asked.

"I guess I'm going to make a stew," Carol said. "It should make a pretty hearty meal to go around."

"Here," he said, "put them three squirrels in it 'cause they ain't gonna make much of a difference and I'll cut you some stew meat outta the dear. Take this," he gave her a cut of meat, "and cook that up as a steak for 'Chonne, it's the best cut."

"I'll do that, Daryl," Carol said, accepting all the meat that he put into a pot for her.

"We gon' hang the rest a' this," Daryl said. "Tyreese said he'll get one of the smokehouses goin'."

"Sounds good," Carol said. "I'll have bath water ready for all of you to bathe before dinner."

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Beau accepted his bowl of stew with a grin and a thank you. He looked more excited about the stew than everyone else. Carol had prepared Michonne's dinner separate, so when she sat the plate in front of her, everyone looked at her.

"Eat," Carol commanded. "All of it."

Michonne looked at the plate and had to admit that the food looked delicious.

"I was just going to eat stew," she said.

"I know you would have, but Daryl special ordered your dinner," Carol said. "So you better eat it."

"That's right, 'Chonne, you gotta eat it," Daryl said.

"I don't think I could eat all this if I tried," Michonne said.

"I could help," Glenn offered.

"You'll do no such thing," Carol said. "Michonne's been busy all day growing another human being, feeding Hope, and trying to take care of herself, you've all done pretty light work in comparison. Let her enjoy her dinner, and if you can come up with a good reason why you should get the same thing, you can take it up with me after dinner while you're doing the dishes."

Michonne would have felt bad for the others, maybe would have felt guilty for eating the spread that Carol had given her, but she was starving and it was delicious, so she ignored the few people who were still watching her eat. It was pretty much the best meal that she could remember since this whole thing started, and though she felt sorry for everyone else, she was enjoying it.

Beau liked this group. He was beginning to put faces together, and figure out through watching their interactions who was who. The stew was damn good, and it had been quite some time since Beau had eaten much in the way of vegetables. Times had been pretty lean during the winter, so he'd been excited lately to have all the animals coming out of hiding.

Today, however, he'd had _hot_ water to wash with, and soap. He was wearing clean clothes now, and the woman, Carol, had told him that she'd wash his. Now he was getting full on the stew and was starting to get tired a little.

"Beau, you weren't travelling with anyone?" Carol asked, refilling his bowl.

"No ma'am," Beau said. "Thank you," he said, when she finished filling up his bowl. "Stew's real good."

"You're welcome, and thank you for the compliment," Carol said, smiling.

"I been on my own a while now. My older brother was the last one with me an' I reckon he died at least six months ago," Beau said. He directed his attention to Tyreese then. "If'n she weren't your woman, I believe I'd have me a go at her," he said grinning, "looks like you got you a nice one."

Carol blushed a little at the compliment and Tyreese smiled at the boy.

"That I did, son, that I did," he said.

"So how's it work around here?" Beau asked. "When someone joins this, um, family, do they get a given a girl or do they pick one or what? I mean if I was to join would I have had to bring my own?"

A rumble of laughter rang through the group.

"You have to get your own," Glenn said, "you're just lucky if you run up on one you like."

Beau nodded and went back to eating his stew.

"Well, I reckon I'm outta luck then," Beau said, "'cause I ain't run up on nobody really 'til today. I seen me two or three people along the road, but I ain't seen a whole lotta people that I wanted to have much to do with. We got some rough 'uns on the road these days."

"We've always had them people around," Daryl said, "it's just that now we got Walkers to deal with and them kind of people to worry about."

"Walkers?" Beau asked.

"You know, Walkers," Daryl said. "The dead people that are ramblin' around outside, or ain't you noticed?"

Beau smiled at him. "Oh, you mean the Nasties!"

"That's a good name for 'em too, I reckon," Daryl said.

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"Does that boy remind you of anyone?" Carol asked Michonne and Rachel while they were doing dishes. Everyone else was still lingering around inside headquarters, chatting and resting after getting their stomachs full.

Michonne snickered. "Yeah, he does," she said.

"What?" Rachel asked. "Who does he remind you of?"

"Daryl," Carol said.

"Really?" Rachel asked.

"Yeah," Michonne said. "Try to imagine what Daryl would have been like at that age, especially if he had a little more confidence."

"And cockiness," Carol said.

"He seems like a good kid," Rachel said.

"Oh, I think he is that, I hope he chooses to stay around after tonight. He might give that Chelsea a little something to keep her busy," Carol said with a laugh.

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Michonne was trying to sleep, but Daryl was worried, and she knew that she wasn't going to sleep well until he was done with that.

"I'm fine, Daryl," she said for about the fourth time.

Daryl was hugging her, rubbing her stomach, just where he remembered her being mad about not being able to button her pants when she'd been pregnant with Hope. So far he couldn't tell any difference. She certainly hadn't gained any weight, though right now he could tell that she was full.

"You know you're being counterproductive," Michonne mumbled.

"What?" Daryl asked.

"You want me to stay awake to talk to you, but you rubbing me like that is making me sleepy," she said.

"You want me to stop?" Daryl asked.

"No, Daryl, honestly what I want you to do is keep rubbing and let me sleep. I promise you that I'm alright now, it was just a little problem, probably with blood sugar. I'm fine, and I feel fine, and I'd feel even better if you'd keep doing that and let me go to sleep," Michonne said.

Daryl kissed her shoulder.

"Alright, I'll let you go to sleep," he said. "I love you."

"I love you too," Michonne said, already starting to drift off.


	62. Chapter 62

**AN: Thank you to those of you who take the time to review. It really does make my day to see what you have to say and know that you're behind the story (or even that you're not so much on board). For those of you who like the story, I hope not to let you down in the future.**

Also, for those of you who like Beau, I'm glad to hear that you do. He's an OC that I've been working out in my mind for a while now, so I was glad to finally unveil him and bring him out to play. 

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After breakfast, everyone went about their business and Carol started washing dishes. To her surprised, Beau hung around headquarters, close to where she was, and watched her for a few minutes.

"You need help?" He asked finally.

"If you want to help, I won't turn you down," Carol said, smiling at him.

Beau took a seat next to Carol and started helping with the dishes. Carol smiled at him. Cleaned up he wasn't a bad looking boy. She had no idea how old he was, and she doubted that he knew that either.

"Do you shave, Beau?" Carol asked, noticing some signs of a beard on the boy.

"No ma'am, at least not recently," Beau said. "I did a couple a' times but I ain't had no razor in a while."

"You don't have a much of a beard," she said.

"Never have growed one," he said. "My uncle used to say that a man's beard was a sign of his masculinity. He used to tease me somethin' awful, and my lil' brother too 'cause we ain't never growed much worth lookin' at."

Carol smiled at him again.

"You've been out there on your own for a while," Carol said. "I guess that's more of a sign of masculinity than facial hair. Would you like to shave? I can get you a razor."

Beau smiled and dried the last of the dishes.

"I'd like that," Beau said. "Thank you, ma'am."

"You can call me Carol," Carol said. "You could stand a haircut too, Beau. I'll take care of that after dinner tonight."

Beau looked at her for a minute. He hadn't really been sure if he was going to stay or not with the group. He hadn't been invited, and he wasn't sure how things worked around here with invitations into their "family".

"You are going to stay, aren't you?" Carol asked, seeing an unsure look register on the boy's face.

"I didn't know if I was gonna stay or not," Beau said.

Carol liked Beau, and she'd decided already that she was keeping him there if she could. He could be an asset to the community, and he was a good kid. Besides, he didn't have anyone else, he might as well stay there.

"Of course you're going to stay," Carol said matter-of-factly. You've got to go hunting today."

Beau smiled at her.

"I guess I'm stayin' then," he said.

Beau had spent the night in what used to be Tyreese's room, and he'd liked sleeping in a house, under a roof. Since he'd left North Carolina he'd been wandering, and since he'd stopped nearby he'd been sleeping in a nest that he'd fashioned for himself up in a tree, having discovered that was the safest way to sleep these days.

Carol collected up the dishes and got up, Beau pulling slightly on her arm.

"You better go find Daryl, let him know you're ready to go when he is," Carol said.

"OK," Beau said. He paused for a minute. "Can I tell you somethin'?" He asked.

"Sure," she said.

"You remind me a lil' bit a' my ma," Beau said.

Carol smiled at him.

"She must have been a good woman to raise such a nice young man," Carol said. "Now you get on and go find Daryl."

Beau nodded and trotted off toward the rabbit pens, having seen Daryl and Tyreese head in that direction earlier.

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They had discovered that they had three females and two males. Tyreese had checked them out when he was putting them in the cage. Now both of the men were just staring at the rabbits.

"Why you ain't gon' eat those rabbits?" Beau asked, coming up.

"'Cause these little fuckers are going to fuck for their lives an' make us more to eat, that way we don't run out," Daryl said.

"What if they don't like each other?" Beau asked.

"Then we'll eat the ones that don't wanna cooperate," Daryl said.

"Carol told me to tell you that I'm ready to go huntin' when you are," Beau said. "She said I was stayin'."

"Oh, did she now?" Daryl asked. He looked at Tyreese and Tyreese just smiled, shrugging a little. "Well, I reckon we better get out there if we're gonna bring somethin' home. Did you have anything else you needed to get from wherever you were stayin'?" Daryl asked. The boy had picked up a green duffel bag before he'd heaved up the deer the night before, but he hadn't had anything else.

"No, I got all my stuff," Beau said.

"Lemme see what you got for huntin' and fightin'," Daryl said. He followed Beau down to the house that he was sharing currently with Sasha and Jimmy. The boy brought the duffel bag into the living room. Daryl noticed it wasn't just an everyday bag. It was an Army rucksack, but he didn't say anything about it. He opened it up and started taking things out. Daryl picked up each of the items and looked at them as Beau laid them on the floor. From the looks of it, most of what the boy had was tools. "A tomahawk?" Daryl asked.

"Yeah," Beau said.

Daryl chuckled. "What the hell you doin' with a tomahawk?"

"After we got run out our land, we passed near Cherokee," Beau said. "We run up with a little group from outta there an' we travelled with 'em for a while. One of the boys in the group gave me the tomahawk an' showed me how to use it."

Daryl put the tomahawk down. Among the other weapons there was a nice hunting knife, a longbow and arrows, and a slingshot. Beau carried no guns and no ammunition aside from the arrows. Daryl picked up the bow and looked at it, slowly realizing it was handmade.

"D'ya get this from them too?" He asked.

"No, I made that." Beau said. "I made the arrows too, and that slingshot."

Daryl just looked at him for a minute.

"I like to whittle a little," Beau said. "It's good for passin' the time. I made a bunch more, but each time I made one I got better at it, so I just kept the better one and left the other." He felt like he needed to explain with the way that Daryl was looking at him.

Daryl examined the arrows. They were well made.

"So you hunt with a bow and arrow?" Daryl asked.

Beau nodded. "I like your crossbow," he offered. "I bet it's better than my bow."

"What good is your slingshot?" Daryl asked. He picked it up and examined it. It was well made, but he couldn't see it being able to take down a Walker or anything of substantial size.

"What'cha think I got them squirrels with?" Beau asked.

Daryl chuckled. "Alright, Beau, get whatever you're taking with you and meet me headquarters," he said. He'd already told the others to meet him there over breakfast, and he was sure that whoever was going would be gathering soon.

When Daryl got to headquarters, there was quite the crowd gathered together.

"All y'all goin'?" He asked, looking at the crowd.

"No," Beth responded, "we were just talking until you got down here." She quickly kissed Junior and walked off with Sasha following her.

Stella was standing in front of him with Junior, Jimmy, and Carl.

"You goin'?" He asked.

Stella nodded her head enthusiastically and smiled.

"You hunt?" Daryl asked her.

"No," she said, "I'm going to fish."

"You gotta bait your own hook," Daryl said.

Stella giggled. "That's fine," she said, "I've been baiting my hook since I was little. I used to go fishing with my grandfather all the time."

"Fine, I don't care," Daryl said.

"Can I hunt with you and Beau?" Carl asked, watching Beau walk up behind Daryl.

"Not yet," Daryl said. "You gotta be able to hunt with somethin' besides guns before you're ready for that. We can't be out in the middle of the woods shootin' at stuff," Daryl said.

Carl's face sunk.

"I could make you a bow," Beau offered, overhearing Daryl's speech to the boy.

"Really?" Carl asked.

"Yeah, no problem," Beau said. "You can practice with it 'til you get good at it, and then you can hunt with us. I wanna get my hands on one of those crossbows, one day," Beau said.

"I could get a crossbow," Carl said.

"You just learn to use the bow first," Daryl said, scruffing Carl's hair. "Then we'll see if you get something with as much power as a crossbow."

Carl scrunched up his face at Daryl and Daryl chuckled at him.

"Fine, let's get to it," Daryl said, going for his rabbit traps. "Get your poles, this train's 'bout to roll out."

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Maggie found Michonne sitting on her porch, mending clothes for Carol. Michonne didn't mind helping with mending, as long as she had the right to say at any time that she was tired of the activity, and Carol had given her that right with anything she chose to help with.

"Did you do something bad?" Maggie asked, mounting the porch steps. She'd been assigned mending a few times, but it was only when she'd done something that really got under Carol's skin.

Michonne looked up for a minute, taking a moment to process what Maggie had just said. Everyone knew that generally Carol reserved mending as a punishment, and it would sound odd for Michonne to admit that she liked it better than some of the other options available to her.

"Yeah," she said, "I got pregnant." She smiled.

Maggie chuckled and sat down across from her in the swing, kicking back for a moment and letting the swing sail forward.

"So," Maggie said, "Glenn and I are thinking on going on a trial run to one of the neighborhoods nearby, just to see what we could get if we put our door to door plan into action. We figured if we had some kind of statistics to show Daryl about what we could get on a run like that, we would be able to decide if it's actually a worthwhile thing to do. Do you know of a nearby neighborhood that would be a good rich people neighborhood to hit up, you know, like this one?"

Michonne thought about it for a few minutes.

"I do, actually, there's another wealthy neighborhood that's not too terribly far from that little store that we were in, you remember where that is?" Michonne asked, putting down her mending for the moment.

"Yeah, I don't think I'm ever going to forget that," Maggie said.

"Well, if you keep going beyond that store, and you turn left on a street that was Palmetto or Pine or something," Michonne paused. "I don't know, it's just after the street and it's some kind of tree, you should run right into the place."

"And you think they were probably like the people who lived here and didn't know what to do with their money?" Maggie asked.

"Yeah, they were a very wealthy neighborhood, but it wasn't a gated community, so you'll need to be extra careful. You won't have any kind of protection from fences," Michonne warned.

"We're going to be as careful as we can, of course. I think Sasha and Dominique are going with us," Maggie said.

"Sasha's good, I've never fought with Dominique before," Michonne said.

"I guess we'll find out what he's capable of," Maggie said. She started to get up.

"Wait," Michonne said, "I wanted to talk to you a minute and lately it's hard to catch you or Glenn. You're always out on runs."

"Sure," Maggie said, sitting down again and kicking off to swing again. "What is it?"

"Has Beth talked to you about moving in with Sasha?" Michonne asked.

"She mentioned something about it, why?" Maggie drew her knees up in the swing and wrapped her arms around them, a normal sitting stance for her.

"I think you should let her move in there, or at least let Junior spend the night at your house if he wants to." Michonne said.

Maggie raised her eyebrows at Michonne and then looked away for a minute.

"They're just kids," Maggie said.

"They're not kids, though, both of them would be legal adults, if that even mattered anymore," Michonne said.

"Well they both seem like kids to me," Maggie said.

"By that logic you and Glenn both seem like kids to me," Michonne said.

Maggie looked at her and absentmindedly scratched her forehead.

"I'm just saying that your dad didn't get in the way of you and Glenn. Tyreese has backed off of Sasha and Jimmy. Beth and Junior are the only two around here that are having to deal with someone breathing down their necks. Maybe you should just think about it, try to think how you would feel if the roles were reversed and you had Beth breathing down your neck and making you feel like you couldn't be alone with Glenn," Michonne said.

"I'll think about it," Maggie said. "Is that it?"

Michonne smiled at her.

"That's it, good luck on your run," Michonne said.

Maggie didn't say anything, she just got up and dismounted the porch steps. Michonne went back to her mending.

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Tyreese and Carol accompanied Chelsea out for water. Beth had taken most of what they had at the community to go down and water the fields, and Carol knew they'd need more water for baths and such. Tyreese was carrying one bucket, and each of the women walking just in front of him had two buckets. He was trying to keep sweeping the area constantly, being the only one carrying his weapon to protect them against Walkers. Luckily since Rick and Rachel had cleared the area around the gates pretty quickly, he'd only had to respond to three or four Walkers.

His other concerns were the hunters. He hoped that Daryl and Beau would check carefully before hearing them rumbling through the underbrush, not talking so as to not scare away any possible game for them, and wouldn't accidentally put an arrow into any of them. That was going to be one of the only problems they had with so much coming and going, it was likely that they all crossed each other's paths a little more often than they wanted to.

When they reached the water they could hear quiet chatter. They filled their buckets and paused, silent, trying to identify if the voices belonged to some of their own or if they'd encountered someone new.

After a few minutes they heard a familiar giggle.

"Stella," Carol whispered.

She started back toward the community and Chelsea followed suit.

Tyreese thought about it. They really needed to sit down and have a whole group discussion about what they wanted to do in the case that they did encounter others. He thought he'd bring it up to Daryl for an after dinner meeting. They needed a policy on new people. Taking in Beau, one boy alone in the woods, was one thing, but if they encountered another _group_ they needed to have an idea about what the entire community might want.

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Daryl's group got back before the run group returned. Tyreese took the three rabbits that Daryl brought and took them out back to put them in the pen with the others. Daryl had gotten two females and one male. Tyreese thought he'd be happy about that. The more females they had, the more they would produce.

Daryl was also thrilled because he and Beau had managed to come upon a flock of turkeys in the area and got two of them. Each one of them carried one of the large birds with the others filing into the community behind them carrying strings of fish.

"Nice birds," Rick said to Daryl once he had shut the gate.

"There's more of 'em too, man, we just got two before the others caught on and made a run for it," Daryl said, grinning.

Carol watched as Junior and Jimmy went off with the fish to clean and Carl tailed after Beau and Daryl to clean the turkeys.

When they reappeared with everything ready to either be hung up or go in the pot, Carol had already prepared everything to fry fish and told Daryl that she'd take the fish off his hands, hoping for a little more time to think about what to do with the turkey. She wasn't sure how the smoked turkey would be put to use later, but she would figure it out. What was important was that they were going to have a good dinner tonight, and slowly they were stocking up on meat for future meals.

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Over dinner Maggie and Glenn reported on their run, which had brought in quite a bit of supplies, enough to think there might be something to their plan of doing neighborhood cleanouts. In the amount of time that they'd been gone, the four of them had brought back several assorted boxes of supplies as well as two cans full of gas.

Daryl had to admit that the idea didn't look half bad now, as long as they stayed lucky and didn't get overrun by herds or run into any hostile others.

"Hey dad," Carl said when there was a lull in the conversation, "Beau said he'd make me a bow and some arrows to practice with and Daryl said I can hunt with them."

Rick looked at Daryl.

"I mean if that's OK with you, man, I just thought the kid outta know how to hunt," Daryl said.

"That's fine with me," Rick said, "but I don't want him shooting arrows in the direction of anyone, and I don't want him to have sharp arrows until he knows what he's doing."

"Don't worry," Beau said, "I can make him some practice arrows, they won't hurt nothin'. I can work with him. I was younger than him when I started using one, it won't be hard for him to learn."

Carl was grinning at Beau, and Rick nodded his acceptance of the plan. It really wasn't a bad idea to teach Carl to hunt. Rick had no doubt that Daryl would have Judith and Hope both out there hunting as soon as he could.

"Beau," Daryl started after a minute, "that rucksack belong to you or you picked it up on the way?"

"That was my pa's," Beau said. "He died when I was young. I was livin' with my ma an' my two brothers and sisters on my grandpa's land. My grandpa died when I was a baby and my grandma died not long after my pa. She thought it weren't right for no ma to outlive her young'uns, and she sorta just gave up. When the Nasties kinda took over they run us out. We all got what we could, but it weren't much an' we left with my uncle. My sisters got overtook by the Nasties an' my ma tried to save 'em." He paused a minute. There was a look of sadness on his face, but it was a look of sadness that had been worked through many times over. It wasn't the kind that would overwhelm him any longer. "After that we was headed for Atlanta, but we never made it there. When I was all that was left, I figured I'd just sorta ramble, you know, 'til I found me a good place."

"Have you been in the area long?" Maggie asked, wondering about the group that the two men had mentioned.

"Not too long," Beau said. "I reckon I been nestin' near here for 'bout two months maybe?"

"And you haven't run into any other groups?" Glenn asked, sensing what Maggie was getting at.

"No, I mean I seen other people, but I ain't interacted with 'em," Beau said. He was quiet for a few minutes. Then he nodded his head as though he was agreeing with someone, though no one had spoken. "It weren't no Nasty that killed my uncle," he said. "We run up on some people and one 'a there men shot my uncle quick as look at 'em, so since then I try not to talk to nobody. I wouldn'ta talked to Daryl if'n I coulda got that rabbit out the trap 'fore he caught me."

The group was quiet, all of them acknowledging the significance of his words.

Tyreese spoke up after a minute.

"That brings me to something that I was going to save until after dinner, but now seems as good a time as any to discuss it," he said, "what do we do if we run up on another group?"

"What'cha mean?" Daryl asked.

"Well, I know we said if we run up on people that we know aren't trustworthy then we tell them to move on or we kill them," Tyreese responded, "but what if we run up on another group that seems peaceful? Do we leave them alone and in peace? Do we invite them back here? What do we do?"

Everyone seemed to be considering his question.

"If they're good people, I guess they should come back here," Glenn said.

"The more people we have, the quicker we've got to move on," Daryl said.

"I agree," Maggie said, "if we get too many people to support we're not going to be able to stay as long, and we don't want to have to move on too soon because of others."

"More numbers does mean more security when we _do_ move on, though," Rick offered.

"If you weren't taking in newcomers, then we wouldn't be here and who knows what would have happened to us," Dominique said, a little sadness to his voice.

"That was different," Daryl said, "they already knowed you."

"But you didn't know us when you took us in," Junior said.

"And we even came with that asshole," Jimmy added, glancing in Carol's direction and deciding not to repeat Earl's name. "But you took us in and you gave us a home."

Beau sat there, trying to figure out exactly how everyone fit together again. Now it was quite clear that none of them had started this together. Why had they taken him in?

"I'm mighty glad you let me stay," Beau said, "and I'd hate to think that if'n I'da had my brothers with me you mighta not let me stay."

Daryl thought about it. They had reached one of those points where he didn't have an answer for the group. He hated to take on any substantial amount of people, but he also hated to turn people away if they were good people. He tried to weigh it out in his mind, he didn't want to move on anytime soon because he wanted Michonne to have as much time as she needed to recover after the baby came. He could easily admit to himself that he was most concerned about that. A certain amount of people wouldn't be that much of a problem, but how do you tell the group when they've reached the limit?

"If it's a small group, or one or two people, we let them join us," Carol offered. "If it's a group comparable to our own then they should be fine on their own. Beau, you were out there alone. No one should have to do this alone."

Daryl was suddenly thankful for Carol's input, seeming that she could read his mind.

"So how many is too many to accept?" Tyreese questioned.

"Five," Maggie offered. "If they're bringing five people we'll accept them, but anything over that has a good chance on their own."

The group seemed to think about it for a while, and eventually all nodded agreement. It wasn't a perfect plan, and like all their plans could stand some tweaking later, but for now they had some rough criteria for the groups they might encounter.


	63. Chapter 63

**AN: So once again I've got a change of pace in the schedule. Between working I'm also visiting with some dear friends and getting a few days in with my precious little godchildren. That means "me" time is limited and takes place mostly at night after the little ones have been tucked away. That means chapters may be shorter/more sporadic for a stretch here, but I'm dropping out on you yet. **

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"I'm so full I feel like I could pop," Michonne said, rubbing lotion on herself. Daryl was lying in bed watching her.

"That's 'cause Carol fills your plate back up the second it looks like you might finish soon. She's determined to make sure you get plenty, and I ain't opposed to it," Daryl said. He flopped on his stomach and bunched his pillow up, his head turned toward her. He liked the smell of this new lotion that she had acquired. It was lavender scented, and something else. She had told him what the smell was, but lavender was all he could remember. The smell made him a little sleepy and he hoped she had plenty of it stored up somewhere. He knew she had rummaged a couple of bottles at least out of storage.

"I can say that for at least the past two days I haven't been hungry at all," Michonne said. "She barely lets me finish one meal before she's pushing some kind of "snack" at me."

"Well, when you finish gettin' all covered up in that stuff, you can crawl under these covers and I'll help you work off some of that dinner," Daryl said.

"Mmmm, you know, I might take you up on that offer," Michonne said.

"What you think of that new boy?" Daryl asked.

"Beau?" Michonne asked. "Can you get my back?" She offered the bottle of lotion to Daryl who struggled up out of his position and crawled over to get behind her and accept the bottle.

"Yeah, Beau," Daryl said.

"I think he's a good boy, Daryl. I don't see any harm in him at all. He's got to be a pretty bright boy too, considering that he made it this far on his own," Michonne said.

"Did you know that Carol told him he could stay, just like that? She didn't even ask nobody else," Daryl said.

"Well is there anyone opposed to him staying? Are you opposed to him staying?" Michonne asked, moaning a little in response to Daryl's massaging of her shoulders. One of the good things about Daryl was that when she asked him to rub lotion on her back, he never just rubbed it on there, he always gave her a massage as a little extra.

"No, I don't reckon anybody was opposed to it," Daryl said.

"Well then, there's no harm in it. I think that sometimes Carol enjoys practicing her authority," Michonne said. Everyone realized by now that Carol did hold a good deal of authority in the community, and it was a position that suited her well, even if it was one that she wasn't used to. She was becoming bolder, and her growing relationship with Tyreese was giving her even more confidence.

Daryl turned his attention from the massage then, and gently pulled on Michonne's shoulder, pulling her down to rest on the bed. She slid down until her head was on the pillow and Daryl hovered over her, smiling his crooked smile.

"Comfortable?" He asked.

She smiled at him. She couldn't help but smile when he made that face.

"Yeah," she said.

He moved down and suckled at her breasts a minute, and she responded, drawing her legs up and shifting toward him a little. He stopped and came back to kiss her, looking her in the eyes for a lingering moment afterwards.

"Anxious?" He asked, smiling. She realized she was already breathing hard. She smiled at him.

"Maybe, a little," she said.

"Maybe I won't keep you waiting as long tonight as I usually do," Daryl said, making his way back down her body.

"Mmmm…I'd appreciate that," she said.

Daryl chucked. "Maybe…" he said.

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The next morning Daryl woke up when he felt the bed shake violently and he heard Michonne stumbling around the room and running out, bounding down the stairs.

He lie there a minute, trying to put it all together in his mind, and finally got up and got dressed. There was no one else stirring in the house, and he assumed it was probably too early for them to be up, or if Carol _was_ up it was likely that Tyreese had already escorted her over to headquarters.

Daryl picked up a bottle of water off the kitchen counter downstairs and started out the back door of the house, taking the back porch steps two at a time. He wandered around a moment before finding Michonne kneeling in the bushes. He walked over and stooped down beside her.

"You OK?" He asked.

Michonne was heaving, but she wasn't actually throwing up. He knew that's what she spent most of her time in the bushes doing. It reminded him, unfortunately, of a few times that he'd gotten so drunk that he'd gotten sick. He could remember how miserable it felt to want to keep throwing up long after he had nothing else to throw up. He wondered if that's how she felt right now.

Daryl wasn't sure what to do, so he just waited on her to stop. When she finally got control of the heaving and sat back on her heels, he offered her the bottle of water. She took it and washed her mouth out, spitting the water out.

"I'm just dandy," she said when she felt it was safe to speak.

"I'm sorry, 'Chonne, I wish I could make it better," Daryl said.

Michonne snickered. "I wish you could too. I'd be glad to let you take this part, and a few others."

Daryl frowned at her. "I would, if I could," he said.

Michonne smiled. "You know what, Daryl, I believe you would," she said.

"Do you wanna get breakfast?" Daryl asked.

He immediately knew that it was too soon to ask that question. He rubbed Michonne's back while she returned to heaving.

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Daryl didn't know how long he sat in the wet grass beside Michonne, but he didn't feel right just leaving her there retching alone, so he'd sat there patiently as the spells came and went. By the time she was ready to get up and actually considering that she might want to eat something, he was fairly certain that breakfast was over. He'd seen people walking away from headquarters and off to do other things, which was a fairly sure sign that they were done and Carol would be cleaning everything up.

Daryl helped Michonne to her feet and they started in the direction of headquarters. As he suspected, they came upon Carol washing dishes with the help of Beau and Beth.

"We're a lil' late," Daryl said as they approached.

"I thought you might be," Carol said. "I kept some oatmeal warm for you, Daryl, and I've got some fruit and granola for Michonne. I'll get it."

She started to get up and Daryl noticed that Beau stood up and offered her a hand. She took it and smiled at him. He said something to her that Daryl couldn't make out and she smiled again, blushing a little.

They were the last two to eat breakfast and Carol left them alone, sending Beth to get the girls and bring them over. Judith had apparently been awake and quiet in the room for a while, but Hope was obviously sleepy when Beth came into the dining room with her. Daryl took her, and she snuggled into his chest, apparently deciding to finish out the rest of her night's sleep there.

"How's your breakfast?" He asked Michonne, shoveling more of the fairly tasteless oatmeal into his mouth.

"Really good," Michonne said.

Daryl chuckled. "It's just some canned fruit and granola," he said, "how good can it be?"

"Carol sprinkled it with cinnamon too. It's really good," she said. He chuckled again.

Carol stepped back into the dining room, carrying Judith.

"How are you two doing? Need anything?" Carol asked.

"I'm fine," Daryl answered her, "and Michonne is just raving on how well you prepare fruit and granola."

Carol smiled at Daryl. He looked really amused, though Michonne didn't seem to notice, or either she didn't care.

"Heightened sense of taste," Carol said.

"What?" Daryl asked.

She laughed a little. "Her tastes are different now that she's pregnant. She can also smell things a lot better, I imagine. It's just something that your body goes through. It can be good at times and bad at times, am I right Michonne?" Carol said.

Michonne nodded.

"The smell thing is mostly bad," Michonne said. "Especially with all the nice odors we can sometimes get around here."

Carol nodded her head. She remembered the heightened smell being a bad thing when she was pregnant with Sophia. She couldn't stand the smell of meat cooking, and onions would send her into fits of heaving within seconds. She couldn't imagine what it would be like to go through that now with the added layers of stench that occupied their daily lives.

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Tyreese was checking the fire in the smokehouse, and stepped out just in time to see Daryl walking past him toward the house.

"Wait up," Tyreese called. Daryl stopped and Tyreese joined him.

"What's up, man?" Daryl asked.

"Just wondering if you were working here today or if you're going out hunting with Beau again today. As far as I can tell everything is going as it should be in the smokehouse, so we should be good to go on filling all three, but we can hold off a bit if you don't feel like going out," Tyreese said.

"I thought I'd work around here a little today," Daryl said. "I think Beau's gonna work on makin' a bow and some arrows for Carl to practice with, so I thought he might need a little time to do that."

"I'm heading down to the demo site in a bit," Tyreese said, "I just want to make sure Carol doesn't need me to do anything for her."

"She probably already got Beau to do it for her," Daryl said. "It don't bother you that he's been down there with her? I mean he's kinda flirtin' with her."

Tyreese laughed. "He is flirting with her, you're right, but it's the harmless kind of flirting."

"What's the harmless kind when he's flirtin' with your woman?" Daryl asked.

"Well, Daryl, Beau doesn't flirt with Carol because he's interested in her, he flirts with her because she likes it and it makes her nice to him. He likes that little bit of attention from her. Carol likes the flirting because all women like to be complimented. It works out well for me, or at least it did last night, so I'm not bothered by it."

"What'cha mean it works out well for you?" Daryl asked.

"Well, when I compliment Carol she's kind of started taking it as just something I should do, and therefore it doesn't _affect_ her as much. Beau has no reason to compliment her, so when he does it, it makes her feel good about herself. The better a woman feels about herself, the more confident she is when she's with you," Tyreese explained.

Daryl thought about it. Tyreese may have a point, but he still wouldn't like for anyone to go complimenting Michonne too much or flirting with her too much. Beau hadn't flirted with her though, so he didn't have any real complaints. He'd let Tyreese handle his own situation.

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"'Chonne," Daryl asked, "do you feel good about yourself?"

Michonne giggled.

"What kind of a question is that?" She asked.

"I asked Tyreese today if it bothered him that Beau was kinda flirtin' with Carol an' he said it didn't 'cause it made her feel good about herself and then she was better to him," Daryl said.

Michonne listened to Daryl's butchered interpretation of what Tyreese had said to him and pieced together what the conversation had probably been like and what Tyreese was really trying to say. Beau was a flirtatious young man, but only in the sense that he frequently complimented women. He'd hadn't made any kind of suggestion toward anyone, but she'd heard him compliment Carol, Beth, and even Rachel. He hadn't complimented her, but then again she wasn't sure if she came across to him as the kind of woman that would appreciate any of his flattery.

Carol _was_ the kind of woman that appreciated his compliments, and it was obvious that they did give her a little boost of self-confidence. She repaid him for the compliments by taking a little extra care with him, which was likely all the payment he wanted for them.

Michonne could easily understand that the confidence boost in Carol would translate into her being a little more forward and a little more sure of herself with Tyreese.

"Women like to be complimented, Daryl. If someone tells a woman that she's pretty, or that she has a nice smile, or nice eyes, or whatever, especially if he's not suggestive about it when she wouldn't want him to be, then she believes it, and it makes her feel better about herself. If Beau tells Carol she's pretty or she has a nice smile, but he doesn't do it in an amorous way," Michonne paused a minute, not sure if Daryl would know what she meant. "I mean if he doesn't do it in a way to say that he wants to have any kind of sexual relationship with her, then she believes it and she's more likely to want to show it off to Tyreese, who she does have a relationship with."

Daryl was quiet for a few minutes.

"And it depends on the day, Daryl, as to how I feel about myself, especially right now," Michonne added.

"'Cause of the hormones?" Daryl asked. He knew that everyone kept telling him to ignore any of the ups and downs in Michonne's moods because she wasn't able to control them and probably didn't understand them herself. He figured hormones were some tricky things to deal with since Michonne was getting really scary with going between acting like he was the greatest thing on Earth and acting like he was the most horrible person she'd ever met, most of the time without him ever being able to figure out what had changed.

Michonne snickered, "Yeah, because of the hormones, I guess."

Michonne had always been irritated by the whole "hormones" thing, even though she knew that was the problem most of the time. Even when she'd been pregnant before, or when she was having her period, it always seemed like people dismissed you when they brought up hormones and she didn't appreciate being dismissed like that. Whether or not she was being irrational, she always felt that her feelings were her feelings and they should be addressed. She was glad that even though Daryl talked about "hormones" he didn't dismiss her feelings. Rather he would always ask her what was wrong and try to talk to her about it. It seemed like the idea of her raging hormones just kept him from becoming too upset when he wasn't able to wrap his mind around whatever was bothering her at the moment.

"Do I compliment you much?" Daryl asked suddenly.

Michonne thought about it a minute. Neither one of them were the type of people that complimented each other often. They didn't make laundry lists of what they liked about each other. She loved his eyes, but she doubted she'd ever told him that. She thought the crooked smile he gave her, and also the evil grin when he was up to something were two of the most adorable things she'd ever seen in her life, but she'd never said that to him. Likewise, he'd only ever complimented her smile as far as she could remember. Maybe it was owing to their personalities, but neither of them was one to profusely compliment the other, though it didn't mean that she didn't think that every little thing about him was wonderful, and she imagined the same could be said for him.

Both of them were much more likely to compliment each other on Walker kills or jobs well done. Those were the kinds of things they were more comfortable giving each other praise on, and that was fine. It worked for them.

Michonne didn't feel any less loved and adored by Daryl because he didn't sit around telling her she was beautiful all day long. He didn't have to wax poetic about her eyes and her skin and her hair for her to know that he loved her. He told her constantly that he loved her, he touched her like he loved her, and he did things to _show_ her that he loved her. He'd started raising rabbits and brought her a deer, among other things, _that_ was the way that Daryl was going to tell her he adored her. That was a language that she could understand.

"You do in your own way, Daryl," she said finally.

"Is that a good way or a bad way?" Daryl asked.

"Neither," she said. "It's just your way." Michonne was quiet for a minute. "And, I guess, maybe it's the perfect way, because I understand it completely."

Daryl was quiet for a few minutes.

Daryl didn't know much about complimenting women. He loved everything about Michonne. He didn't know how to tell her that, though. He'd feel silly if he just started telling her each and every part of her that he loved, because he didn't know which ones it was OK to tell her about, and which ones she might not want to hear about. If she needed complimenting, though, he wanted to do it. He wanted her to feel good about herself.

"Do I compliment you enough to make you feel good, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked.

"Yes, Daryl, you make me feel good," Michonne responded.

Daryl kissed her shoulder in response and wrapped his arm around her.

"How about you, Daryl?" Michonne asked. "Do I do enough to make you feel good?"

Daryl thought about it. He really wasn't used to being complimented a lot, but he felt like Michonne always told him when he'd done things that were good, and that always made him feel good. Michonne told him that she loved him, and that made him feel real good. He wasn't sure if that was a compliment or not, but really everything about her made him feel good, especially her letting him hold her in his arms like he was right now, and like he did most every night when they went to sleep.

"You make me feel real good, 'Chonne," he said.

"Then I'd say we're doing it just right, Daryl," Michonne said.


	64. Chapter 64

**AN: I thought this would be a short one, due to the fact that I spent most of my evening watching Snow White for the third time and functioning as a recliner for a four year old, but when I got started I just couldn't stop writing, so here it is. **

**I also want to thank all of you, again, who keep reviewing, you really spur me on to keep writing and to keep going with our characters and what will become of them. I appreciate all of your comments.**

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"What are you doing?" Michonne asked Beau. She had come to get a few sticks of wood for the fire they were heating to do laundry and found him burrowing around in the wood shed.

Beau jumped when she spoke to him and looked at her for a minute. Michonne waited on him to respond. It was clear that Beau still wasn't entirely comfortable with her, but she hadn't done anything to earn any distrust from him, and she wasn't wearing her katana while wandering around helping Carol with day to day tasks. She did wear a knife around her waist, just in case, but Carol had requested that she shed the katana.

"Lookin' for wood," Beau said.

"Well, you've come to the right place," Michonne said. "Anything in particular you're looking for?"

"A good piece," Beau said. "I'm tryin' ta make a bow for Carl, and the last piece I had just splintered all to hell. Pardon my French."

Michonne smiled at him.

"Well, I hope you find something good to use, we've got all kinds of wood here. It's nice of you to do that for Carl, I'm sure he'll really appreciate it," Michonne said, smiling at him.

Michonne started collecting up pieces.

"You need help with that?" Beau asked.

"I think I can manage," Michonne said.

Beau had frozen in his search and Michonne could feel him watching her. Finally she stopped.

"Here," she said holding out the wood that she'd collected, "maybe I do need you to carry it for me."

Beau nodded and took the wood from Michonne with a nod. She piled a few more pieces on top of the pile to make herself feel better about relinquishing the load to the boy. He started back toward where they were doing laundry with Michonne just behind him.

"Daryl told me you was havin' him a baby," Beau said.

Michonne smiled to herself.

"I suppose I'm having a baby for _both_ of us," Michonne said.

"But it's Daryl's baby, right?" Beau asked.

"Yes, Beau, it's _our_ baby," Michonne said.

"Well then you ought not to be carryin' no wood around, ought'n you?" Beau asked.

Michonne sighed.

"No, Beau, I guess I shouldn't be carrying the wood, it's a good thing I found you up there," Michonne responded. "Just make sure you get to work on that bow as soon as you put the wood down, I'm sure that Carl is looking forward to learning how to use it."

"Don't worry, I will," Beau said.

Michonne followed him right up to where they were washing. Carol smiled at Beau when he asked her where she wanted the wood and she directed him. For good measure he put a few pieces on the fire she had burning.

Michonne went to take her place next to Carol and was surprised to feel Beau catch her arm to help her sit down. She looked at him and smiled. He was grinning at her.

"Thank you," she said.

"You're welcome. I'ma get on back to makin' that bow now," Beau said. He nodded at Carol and trotted back off in the direction of the wood shed.

Michonne looked at Carol, who was grinning.

"What are you grinning at?" Michonne asked.

"Oh admit it, Michonne, you can't help but smile at the boy. He's got some manners, if nothing else," Carol said.

"He's a cute boy," Michonne agreed. "I think he's a little afraid of me," Michonne said.

Carol giggled, "It takes a while for that to pass," she said.

Michonne teasingly cocked an eyebrow at her, "Do you mean to say that you're not afraid of me, Carol?"

Carol splashed her with some of the laundry water.

"No, Michonne, I'm not afraid of you anymore," Carol said, "I might be if I had any reason to be, but as it stands, I'm not."

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"Daryl, we're going on a neighborhood run, you in?" Glenn asked, finding Daryl down at construction. He had mentioned that he'd be interested in going on a run soon, so Glenn thought he'd offer while they were figuring out who was going.

"Yeah, I'll go, who else is going? Maggie?" Daryl asked, stopping what he was doing and wiping his forehead.

"No, actually, she's staying here. Dominique is going and we'll probably take someone else," Glenn asked.

"Is Dominique good if we run into trouble?" Daryl asked.

"We haven't run into too much trouble but he seems to be able to hold his own pretty well with what we have seen," Glenn said.

"Fine," Daryl said, "let's take Beau and see what he can do. He ain't never been on a run and we might as well break him in."

"Sounds good," Glenn said. "I'll go find him and we'll meet at headquarters."

"Fine, I gotta go get my crossbow and tell 'Chonne we're goin' out for a while," Daryl said, starting in one direction while Glenn started in the other.

When Daryl got his crossbow he went down to headquarters. Maggie was down there and she had the girls. He stopped to pat Judith on the head, but she was too occupied with the ball she was playing with to pay him too much attention. He took Hope from Maggie for a moment and kissed, her lifting up and blowing on her belly so that she would laugh at him. He handed her back to Maggie and went over to where Michonne and Carol were scrubbing laundry.

"I'm going on a run with Glenn, we shouldn't be gone too terribly long," Daryl said.

He walked over to Michonne. She reached out to him and he helped her get up. She kissed him gently and hugged him.

"Be back before dark?" She asked.

"You know it," Daryl said. He smiled at her and kissed her again.

"Knock that mess off!" Glenn said, walking up. Daryl knew full well that he'd already said his goodbyes to Maggie.

Dominique and Beau sauntered up behind them and the four of them loaded into the two delivery trucks, with Daryl and Beau in one and Glenn and Dominique in the other. Rick and Rachel open the gates and cleared the Walkers out of their way to allow them to pass.

"So what we do on these 'runs' anyway?" Beau asked when they were following Glenn through the streets to whatever neighborhood he had picked out to loot.

"We go house to house and get as much useful stuff as we can get without gettin' tore up by Walkers. Keep your eyes peeled for people too, kid, they ain't always good news," Daryl said.

"Oh, I know that," Beau said.

"Your uncle," Daryl said, "you said he got shot by some people in North Carolina, what they shoot him for?"

"I don't know," Beau said, "they just shot him."

"They ain't had a reason to shoot him?" Daryl asked.

"Not that I know of," Beau said. "He went down to ask 'em 'bout tradin' for some food ta eat an' the next thing we knowed they shot him."

"Where were you?" Daryl asked.

"We was hidin' in the woods, my brothers an' me. He didn't want us to all go down there in case they weren't real nice, an' I reckon it was a good thing we didn't go," Beau answered.

Daryl didn't respond, but the boy's story did confirm something he'd been worried about for a while. Even though his group had decided that they wouldn't kill anyone without at least some sort of a reason to do so, that didn't mean that there weren't other people out there who weren't against killing just for the sake of killing. It made him feel even more uneasy about the prospect of encountering others, and what those encounters might mean for how his group was going to be forced to interact with others. It would be a sad day when you had to assume that anyone you met might kill you just for being there.

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The run was going pretty well. They'd chosen a central location to park the trucks and had spread out to clear houses. Dominique and Beau were sticking close together while Daryl and Glenn worked houses. The trickiest part was getting the supplies from the houses to the trucks, since there was a fair number of Walkers sauntering around the streets, and it seemed like every time they got them all cleared, another cluster appeared.

Still, they tried to keep a steady stream of boxes and bags of things flowing out of the houses and into the trucks, trying to keep a record of which houses they'd looted by tying bits of cloth around the doorknobs of houses that were clean. Glenn and Maggie had started the idea when they'd figured out it would take far more than one run to clean out this neighborhood, since each house afforded them a wealth of various supplies.

Daryl was only vaguely aware of the time, but he was starting to get a little hungry. He was upstairs in one of the houses packing burlap sacks full of everything that he could find in the bathrooms. Glenn was downstairs raiding the pantries. There had only been two Walkers in that house, but Daryl hoped more than two people had lived here for the amount of stuff they had. It was an example of how much stuff people had been comfortable hoarding before all this madness had begun.

"Glenn, what time is it?" Daryl asked. He clearly didn't mean an hour, since it had been ages since any of them had kept up with time, but he did expect some report on how late it seemed to be getting in relation to nightfall.

"You might want to come on, Daryl," Glenn called up the stairs. "We lost track of time and it's going to be getting dark soon."

Daryl grabbed up the bags he had and started down the stairs, meeting Glenn just before the front door. Daryl strapped the bags across himself so that they would hang on him and allow him to use his arms, one of Maggie's great ideas, and lifted his crossbow, ready to cover Glenn who had his hands full.

As they stepped out on the porch, though, Daryl became instantly aware that they weren't going to make it down the street to their trucks, at least not right now. There was a very distinct herd of Walkers coming, and they wouldn't be able to beat it. Daryl was also certain that the two of them alone wouldn't be able to fight them off. They retreated into the house and shut the door.

"What are we going to do?" Glenn asked in a low voice.

"We're going to wait them out," Daryl said. "There ain't nothin' else we can do. We can't go out there in that. We'll just have to let 'em pass and then we'll head back."

"It's going to be getting dark soon," Glenn said.

"I know, and I don't like that anymore than you do, but we ain't too far from the community. We'll let the herd pass, load the last of this stuff, and we'll drive straight back to the community, no stops for nothin'," Daryl responded.

"What about Dominique and Beau?" Glenn asked.

"Where are they?" Daryl asked.

"The last I saw them they were two doors down from us," Glenn said.

"Well if they got any sense between 'em they'll stay put 'til this herd passes on through," Daryl said.

He wasn't sure how big the herd was, but he could hear them passing outside in the street. Their growling and groaning made his skin crawl. They were slow moving, and it sounded like there was a lot of them, but it also seemed like they had no interest whatsoever in exploring any of the houses, and Daryl was thankful for that.

"Maggie is going to be worried sick," Glenn said. "We should have kept better track of the time."

"If it weren't for this herd we still coulda made it back with decent time," Daryl said. "Besides, if you think Maggie's gonna be worried, just think how 'Chonne's gonna be," he added. He hated that she would worry, and he was sure she would, because they weren't going to make it back before dark. As the light outside was fading, he was sure of that much.

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"What the hell do we do?" Dominique asked, crawling around on the floor and looking out the window of the house. Beau was sitting with his back to the door. They'd been alerted to the time by the groans and moans of the passing herd and now they were trapped in the house as it grew increasingly dark.

"What'cha mean what we gon' do?" Beau asked. "Ain't you been on no run before?"

"Well, yeah, but we always left before dark. They always came and got me if it was getting late," Dominique said. "And I've never seen this many Walkers just roaming about."

"You don't think they left us, do you?" Beau asked.

"I don't know, I can't see the trucks from here," Dominique said, peeking over the top of the window frame.

Beau got up and started up the stairs. When he got up there he went to the far bedroom and looked out the side window. The trucks were still there. Daryl and Glenn hadn't left them, but there was a sea of Walkers below them.

Beau came back downstairs.

"Dominique, man, leave the stuff, but bring your knife. We gotta go find out what they wanna do," he said.

"Are you crazy?" Dominique said. "We can't go out there!"

"We ain't goin' outta the door. We gon' go another way," Beau said.

Dominique followed Beau upstairs.

"What are you doing?" Dominique asked when Beau opened the window.

"We got an easy way to get to where they are," Beau said. He started to climb out the window.

"Beau, I don't know if you've noticed, but we're two stories up," Dominique said.

"Shhh…" Beau hissed. "I know we are, but Nasties can't climb trees, just follow me," he whispered.

Before Dominique knew what was happening, Beau flung himself out of the window and into the branches of a tree that was growing between the two houses. Dominique was not entirely sure of this plan, but he watched as Beau, apparently unnoticed by the herd below him, made his way through the tree and onto the roof of the porch for the house next to the one they were in. Beau stopped a moment when he was securely on the roof and motioned to Dominique. Dominique took a deep breath, said a quick prayer and leapt toward the tree. He was surprised when he made contact securely among the branches. He clung there for a moment before proceeding on, finally reaching the porch roof and feeling Beau pull him up.

Together the two boys carefully made their way across the front of the house. Beau paused before they got to the end of the roof. There was another three there, and the branches reached the side of the other house just as perfectly as he could have hoped for.

"One more time, man, an' we're home free," Beau said. He leapt into the tree and Dominique watched him make his way toward the upstairs window of the other house. Dominique followed suit and soon he wasn't far from Beau on the branches. Beau was trying to quietly pry the upstairs window open with his tomahawk. "Don't know why the hell you lock your upstairs window," Beau whispered, "who the hell would break into it?"

"You would," Dominique whispered back. Beau snorted.

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They had eaten dinner already, or rather Carol had made dinner to keep herself occupied and most everyone else had picked at it. Some were trying to ignore the fact that it was dark and the group hadn't returned, but others couldn't ignore it. Carol was worried sick, but she was desperately trying to hold it together for the others.

As soon as Carol dismissed them from the meal, Maggie got up from the plate that she left untouched.

"Maggie, Beth, Stella, y'all come back to our house," Carol said. "I'm not doing dishes tonight, we're going to go back to the house and wait for them to get back. Anyone else who wants to come is welcome."

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The living room was pretty full.

Tyreese was sitting in one of the chairs and Carol was sitting between his legs. He kept squeezing her on the shoulder, knowing that she was fighting back her own nerves for the good of the others there. They'd put the girls to bed early, and luckily neither had protested the impromptu bedtime. Carol kept casting nervous glances at the others in the living room. Stella and Chelsea sat on the floor, hugged together. Maggie and Beth sat at one edge of the couch, Maggie hugged into Beth, both occasionally sobbing, as did the girls on the floor. Michonne was sitting on the far end of the couch attempting to remain straight-faced and appear calm. Carol might have believed she was calm if she didn't know her better, but she knew that Michonne's nerves were just as shot as everyone else's. She'd gotten sick once, excusing herself with morning sickness and sat clutching the arm rest, obviously nowhere near as calm as she hoped to indicate, refusing to speak a word to anyone.

"They're coming back, though? Right?" Stella said.

"They have to come back. I mean Dominique got us through a lot of bad situations, he's going to come back…" Chelsea said.

"They're coming back," Carol said in the most reassuring tone that she could manage.

"What if they don't come back?" Beth asked, quietly, hugging Maggie closer to her.

"They're coming back, Beth," Carol said sternly. She noticed out of the corner of her eye that Michonne took several deep breaths, trying to steady herself again.

"They're never gone this late," Beth said.

"There's a perfectly reasonable explanation for their lateness, I'm sure," Carol said. "They'll be back, and we'll be here waiting on them when they get back." She was quiet for a minute. No one else dared say a thing at the moment. She didn't know how long they'd been waiting, but it felt like it had been an eternity. "I need to get together some wood, Tyreese, I know it's late, but they'll probably want a hot bath when they get back," Carol said.

"Just wait a little, Carol," Tyreese said, squeezing her shoulder. "I'll help you get it when they get back."

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Daryl heard something upstairs, and he couldn't figure out what he was hearing. The herd outside was still passing, but there were fewer now than there had been. He knew that Walkers weren't making the noise, they'd cleared the house well and would be aware if there were any Walkers in there by now.

"Do you hear that?" He asked Glenn.

"All I hear are Walkers outside," Glenn said. It was dark enough in the house now that Daryl could barely see Glenn.

"I'm going upstairs to see what it is," Daryl said. "Do you got a flashlight or anything?"

"Yeah, I found one in the kitchen," Glenn said. He dug around in the box next to him, studying objects to try to determine what they were in the dark. Finally he found the flashlight. The batteries, though dull, were enough to shine a little light.

Daryl took the flashlight and started up the stairs, an arrow in his hand, fearing hand to hand combat if there were any threats there at all. Once he got upstairs he followed the sound to one of the bedrooms and found that there was someone scratching at the _outside_ of the window. He walked to the window and the dull beam fell across Beau's face.

Daryl switched off the flashlight, unlocked the window and raised it.

"What the hell are you doing?" He whispered. Beau was already making his way into the window.

"We were comin' to find out what we were supposed to do, an' also ta make sure y'all didn't leave us," Beau whispered.

The boy was confident as he crawled through the window, but Daryl tugged him in anyway. He reached out his hand for Dominique, who seemed much less confident crawling around in the trees, and the boy took it. He pulled him through the window and gently closed it back.

"You coulda got yourself killed," Daryl said when the window was closed.

"Nah," Beau said, "Nasties don't climb trees."

"You coulda fell out the tree," Daryl said.

"I don't fall out trees," Beau responded.

"I might have fallen out of it, though," Dominique said. He was still a little panicked.

"Looks like the Nasties are almost gone," Beau offered. He didn't bother to tell Daryl how long they'd been out there, scratching at the window in hopes that he could get it open without the loud noise that breaking the pain would have caused.

Daryl switched the half dead flashlight on to lead them downstairs.

"All the damn pups we got ain't got no sense," Daryl said to Glenn as a form of explanation when he reappeared in the room leading Beau and Dominique.

"I think the coast is clear," Glenn said. "I haven't seen any Walkers pass since you went upstairs."

"We better wait it out another minute or two," Daryl said. "Let 'em get a lil' distance between us and them 'fore we try to make a run for the trucks."

They weren't sure exactly how long they had waited before they finally decided to take a chance running for the trucks. Glenn and Daryl darted out the doors first, carrying what they could of supplies. It seemed like the coast was clear, and Daryl didn't bother to look back, sure that the two boys were right behind them. They threw the last of the items into the back of the trucks and closed them as quietly as possible. As Daryl turned to start for the driver side of his truck, he was surprised by three Walkers that seemed to almost appear out of nowhere, and then he was sickeningly aware that there were many more than three growling in the area.

It was almost too dark to see the Walkers. The only thing that let him know their locations was the growling and the occasional brush of one. Daryl kept his back to the truck and fought all of them that he became aware of. He could hear sounds of exertion from Glenn, not far from him. He had absolutely no idea what had become of the boys.

A cry in the darkness told Daryl that all was not right with the boys. He tried to make his way back toward where they had been, cursing to himself that the darkness made it impossible to see. He bumped into something and before he could turn to stab it he heard Beau's voice, whispering.

"It's me," Beau said, "they got Dominique."

The cries continued and Daryl hesitated for a moment, not sure what he should do.

"Get in the truck," Daryl whispered to Beau.

"You can't save him, they're all over him, it's our only chance to get out and he's as good as gone," Beau said.

Beau didn't like the truth any more than anyone else. He'd seen it before, lost both his brothers in a similar fashion, but once that many had someone, there was no way to save them.

"We gotta go," Beau said, tugging at Daryl.

Daryl started back toward the truck, hoping to run into it, since he could barely see the silhouette of the vehicle. He heard another walker and turned, feeling himself make contact, the Walker fell, but the sound didn't die down. Suddenly he heard a thud, and the sound quieted. Daryl continued back to the truck, getting in and closing the door. Beau appeared suddenly in the seat next to him, closing the door.

Daryl cranked the truck, the illumination of his headlights revealed a mass of Walkers in front of them, in the direction from which they had come, and his stomach flopped. The Walkers were feeding, and Daryl wished that he didn't know what they were feeding on. He pulled the truck forward a little, turning it around in the street. He realized that he didn't know what had become of Glenn. As he turned, though, the other truck roared to life and the headlights came on. Daryl pulled up beside Glenn and Beau rolled down his window. Glenn rolled down the passenger side window.

"Dominique?" He asked.

"We gotta go, man, follow me," Daryl said.

Glenn understood him perfectly. Silently he rolled up the window and pulled forward to turn his own truck around, sadly eyeing the Walkers which were beginning to grow curious about the growling of the engines.

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Josh and Brenda had swung open the gates for them, clearing out the Walkers. Both of them had immediately embraced the three of them as they spilled out of the trucks. They weren't going to bother with unloading the trucks tonight, they'd just leave them in the streets until morning. Daryl was exhausted and heart heavy. He started toward the house as everyone came spilling out of his front door, and other front doors.

Maggie bounded out the house first and pushed ahead of the crowd. Behind her danced the light of several lanterns, illuminating a few figures. Maggie leapt into Glenn's arms, crying and Beth ran over to wrap herself around both of them.

Daryl saw Michonne coming, running almost as fast as Maggie, and when she wrapped her arms around him he thought for a minute that it might strip him entirely of breath. Daryl didn't think he'd ever been hugged so tightly. Michonne was gasping, heaving for breath, and the sound that issued forth from her was one that Daryl hadn't heard before. She was shaking and he realized that she was crying violently, wordlessly. Daryl wrapped his arms around her, holding her up, sensing that she was no longer really capable of supporting her own weight. He was completely unaware of anything else that was happening around him at that moment.

Daryl had never imagined that he'd have had the effect on anyone that his absence had apparently had on Michonne this night. He knew that she was worried, but he'd never imagined that she would react this way, grasping at him, sobbing into his shoulder, shaking. She still hadn't _said_ anything, she'd just continued the cries. As she started to calm a little, Daryl started to look around. Maggie and Glenn had finally parted. Carol was hugging Beau, and he could see that close to her Stella and Chelsea were hugging each other and audibly sobbing. They would know by now that Dominique wasn't coming back.

When Michonne finally quieted, she pulled away from Daryl, apparently not caring that they were in the street, surrounded by others who were discussing what had happened, and were mourning the loss of one of their family members.

"You came back," she said, smiling a little through the tears that were evident on her face. She ran her fingers through his hair.

"I told you I was comin' back," Daryl said.

Michonne's face contorted like she was going to start crying again and Daryl pulled her to him, shushing her and rubbing her back.

"I come back, 'Chonne, I'm right here," he said. He almost wanted to cry right along with her. This was the worst he'd ever seen her cry.

When she calmed again he pulled her off of him and kissed her.

"We needa go inside, 'Chonne," he said. "I need a get a bath, and we can go to bed, you look like you need to sleep."

Everyone else had started to disappear. Glenn and Maggie were gone, Beth was walking away with Stella and Chelsea, and Beau had started off in the direction of his house. It was just Daryl and Michonne standing in the street, and not far from them Tyreese stood with his arm around Carol, waiting for them.

"Come on, 'Chonne," Daryl said, pulling away from her again. As he started to lead her toward the house he felt her step falter a little, and without saying anything he put his arm around her, supporting her.

As he got closer, Carol came over and hugged both of them.

"I'm glad to see you made it back," she said. Daryl could see tears glimmering in her eyes, and her voice was cracking.

"We didn't all make it back," he said solemnly.

"I know, Daryl," she said. "Sometimes we don't all make it back…but I'm glad _you_ did. Why don't you take Michonne upstairs, I'll bring you some bath water and things will look better in the morning," Carol said. She sighed.

"Yeah," Daryl said, "I'm gonna take her upstairs."

Daryl led Michonne upstairs and to the bed. She had stopped crying now, but she was fairly expressionless otherwise. He figured that she'd probably used up whatever energy she had left worrying and crying, and maybe she didn't feel like talking anymore.

While he was waiting on his bathwater, Daryl carefully undressed Michonne, who was still sniffing occasionally. He helped her into bed and noticed that she watched him as he stripped himself down finally, having accepted the bathwater from Carol. He washed quickly and then brought a cloth over to the bed, washing Michonne's face gently. She allowed him to do it.

Before Daryl could get into bed good, Michonne was sliding up tight against him. He put his arm around her and hugged her.

"I love you, 'Chonne," Daryl said.

"I love you," she said. He heard her voice crack a little and she started to shake again.

"Shhh…" Daryl said. "Don't cry no more, 'Chonne. I'm right here, I told you I was gonna come back, and I come back."

"I got so scared," Michonne said. "I was so worried that you weren't going to make it back, that I wasn't going to see you again."

"Shhh…" Daryl repeated. "Go to sleep, 'Chonne. I come back. I'll always come back. You ain't gonna get rid a' me that easy," he said.

Michonne chuckled a little in spite of herself.

"I don't ever want to be rid of you, Daryl," she said.

"Good, 'cause I ain't goin' nowhere," Daryl said. "You're pretty much stuck with me. Now get some sleep."

Michonne closed her eyes and sighed. Daryl pulled her tighter and she felt the familiar scratching of his beard as he nuzzled the back of her neck. She fought back the tears again, so thankful that she could fall asleep that night with the same safe, comforting scratching. He was asleep before her, snoring softly, and she let the sweet sound lull her off to sleep.


	65. Chapter 65

**AN: Short chapter, sorry. **

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The following two weeks had been difficult for the group. It had taken several days before anyone wanted to leave the community for anything, or wanted to allow anyone they loved to leave for any reason.

Stella had clearly taken the loss of Dominique the hardest, and she wasn't her normal chatty, cheerful self in the slightest. Chelsea had also taken it pretty hard. Though she'd had no intimate relationship with Dominique, she had viewed him as the one that had kept her protected when they were on their own. Michonne could understand both of them having a hard time dealing with the loss, and she wished that she could do something to help them through it, but she couldn't. In fact, she felt that, at times, they looked at her and at Maggie as though they resented them, perhaps because Glenn and Daryl had both returned safely, or maybe it was just something she was imagining.

Michonne was sorry that Dominique hadn't made it, but there was nothing that could be done about it now. She was very glad that it wasn't her that was two weeks into dealing with a loss, she couldn't imagine what that would be like. She felt guilty, sometimes, when she saw Stella, because she knew that deep down she was thankful that if they were returning one person short, that it wasn't Daryl they had lost.

_I'm only human_, she thought. _We're all only human_. At the end of the day everyone grieved for the losses of the group, but they grieved more for their own losses, for the losses of those who had the most impact in their lives, and losing Daryl was something she didn't want to imagine.

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After breakfast Michonne joined Carol, balancing Hope on her hip.

"I'm going to look for clothes today," Michonne said, standing over Carol.

"What?" Carol asked, looking up at her and shading her eyes from the sun.

"My clothes really aren't fitting well anymore," Michonne said, "I'm going to search the houses and see what I can find."

"A lot of these houses had babies, I'm sure there are plenty of maternity clothes," Carol said. "Why don't you stay with me, do some easy jobs. I'll send Maggie and some of the others to collect together whatever they can find. You don't need to be lugging things around."

Michonne sighed.

"I think I can handle carrying some clothes, Carol," she said.

"I didn't say you couldn't handle it, I said you didn't need to be doing it," Carol responded, ignoring Michonne's annoyed tone of voice. "I've seen you fight pregnant, but it doesn't mean you need to be putting any strain on yourself if you don't have to. Sit down here and help me finish the dishes. When Maggie passes by I'll send her out to get you clothes. She'll enjoy it anyway, you might as well let her do something to get ready for the baby."

Michonne sighed again. She really didn't like the idea of always sending everyone to do things for her. The past few weeks it seemed that all she'd been allowed to do was laundry, dishes, mend clothes, help with the food, and occasionally, and it was rare, carry something light from one location to the other. She felt like if she continued this way that everyone was going to start thinking that she was helpless, even far less useful than Beth, and the thought of everyone considering her someone who wasn't capable of doing anything was driving her insane.

"Sit down here, Michonne, we need to talk," Carol said.

Michonne looked at Carol and hesitated a moment, the look on Carol's face, however, was one of determination, so MIchonne thought she should at least hear her out for a moment. Michonne handed Hope to Carol, and unbuttoned her pants. Then she sat down beside Carol who was now smirking at her.

"What?" Michonne snapped.

Carol smiled.

"Pants too tight?" She asked.

"Why do you think I want to go looking for clothes?" Michonne asked, taking Hope back. Hope tugged at one of her dreadlocks and she reached up to unwrap the baby's fingers from it.

"Michonne, do you want to tell me why you've got an attitude with me every time I tell you to do something or not to do something?" Carol asked. "We agreed before you ever got pregnant that if I was going to be the one responsible for helping take care of you and helping you deliver this baby that you would do what I thought was best…"

Michonne started to interrupt her, but Carol held up her hand.

"_And_ I remember you agreeing that you wouldn't argue about it, so what's going on now?" Carol finished.

"I just think you're being overprotective," Michonne said. "I'm not helpless, and I don't like looking helpless to the rest of the group."

Carol snickered.

"Is that what you think, Michonne? Do you think everyone looks at you like you're helpless?" Carol asked.

"I know they do," Michonne said. "You won't even let me go for water anymore."

"That's Daryl's call, not mine," Carol said. "Daryl doesn't want you outside the gates _at all_, and I don't blame him. It's not that we doubt you _could_ take care of yourself, it's that there's no reason for you to be in that situation if you don't have to be. There's a difference. I can guarantee you that no one here thinks that you can't do all of the things that they do, but there's no reason for you to do them when there's someone else that can take care of it. All I'm asking is that you take it easy for a little while, just give yourself a break, and after the baby comes and you've recovered, you can go right back to doing everything, just like before."

Michonne wanted to argue with Carol, but she wasn't really sure what she wanted to say. She was still very irritated with the situation.

"I just feel like I'm not really contributing around here. I'm not doing anything useful or important," Michonne said.

"I see," Carol said. Something in her face changed a little. She didn't say anything, but she did gather up the dishes and get up, heading back to headquarters to put them away until it was time to serve lunch.

Michonne watched her as she walked away. She came back a few minutes later, carrying a bag of something. She grabbed up the pan full of dish water and tipped it over, letting the water run away from her. Then she turned and started toward the backyard, not saying anything to Michonne.

Michonne finally got to her feet and then picked Hope up, following after Carol. Carol was feeding the rabbits and stuffing some of the old clothes they'd used as bedding back into the covered area of the rabbit pen.

"They keep pulling it out?" Michonne asked.

"Mmm hmm," Carol said, not looking up at her.

The rabbits, although wild, were actually quite tame. They allowed you to pet them, and Daryl would pick them up by their ears, examining them to see if they were getting fatter. It was clear that two of their females were expecting babies, and probably any time now. Carol rubbed the head of one of them with the back of her hand and then closed the pen. She got up and dusted her hands on her pants, walking toward the smokehouse to check the fire in there.

Carol's movements were jerky, and Michonne could tell that Carol wasn't speaking to her on purpose.

"Now do you want to tell _me_ what's wrong?" Michonne finally called out to her.

Carol swung open the door to the smokehouse.

"Stay out here, I'll be right back. The smoke's a little heavy," she said, going inside. A few minutes later she emerged and shut the door, wiping her forehead with the back of her arm.

She stood facing Michonne, her hands on her hips.

"Well?" Michonne asked, shifting sides with Hope.

"Well what, Michonne?" Carol asked.

"What's wrong with you now?" Michonne asked.

"Really, Michonne? You can't figure out what's wrong with me? You're an intelligent woman, I'm sure you can muddle through it. You don't really need things explained to you on quite the level that Daryl does, now do you?" Carol said sharply.

Michonne was surprised. She'd never heard Carol take that tone of voice with her before. Carol could throw a sarcastic comment every now and again, and she was even caustic from time to time, but it was clear that there was something different in her voice right now, and her stance was different as well.

"Are you _mad_ at me?" Michonne asked.

"No, Michonne, I'm not mad at you," Carol said. "Go do whatever it is you've got to do," she said, turning around and starting down the street. Michonne tagged behind her for a second. "I've got to do some of the useless things around here so everyone else can have enough time to take care of all the important things," she snapped.

Michonne stopped for a minute, realizing that what she had said had apparently struck Carol as a negation of her importance in the group.

"Carol," she called. "Carol, stop!"

Michonne caught up with Carol and Carol turned around, looking annoyed and a little hurt.

"I didn't mean it like that," Michonne said, "and I think you know that. You know that what you do around here is important and you know that every one of us is thankful for it. I guess that I'm just in a bad mood. My clothes don't fit, and I don't feel like myself. I wasn't ever domestic, so to speak. My house was always a mess. I had someone come in to clean up once a week just because otherwise I never stayed on top of things. I guess that when I'm doing all the things that you have me do, I just don't feel like myself, and I don't feel like I'm doing what _I _am usually doing to help the group. It's not that I don't see that these things are important, because they are."

Carol nodded her head.

"It's OK, I know you didn't mean it like it came off," she said finally. "I'm not really mad. I guess you have kind of been forced out of your role."

"What are you going to do now?" Michonne asked.

"Ration boxes," Carol said.

"Let me see if Beth will keep Hope while she's watching Judith, and I'll help you," Michonne said.

"I thought you were going looking for clothes," Carol said.

"We'll send Maggie and whoever she wants to take with her. They can surprise me," Michonne responded.

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"How's he doin'?" Daryl asked, finding Rick watching Beau and Carl work with Carl's new bow on one of the streets.

"I don't think he's hit a single one of the targets yet, but Beau's got a lot of patience with him," Rick said quietly.

"It ain't gonna come over night," Daryl said. "It's a lot different than aimin' a gun. I've used a regular bow before, it's a different kinda skill set."

Daryl stood quietly for a minute watching the two boys. Each time Carl would load the bow, Beau would stand beside him or behind him, directing him on how to hold it, how to move one arm or the other, which way to aim. It would take a while, but Daryl felt like Beau would be a good teacher for Carl. He didn't seem to ever get frustrated, really not at anything, and that infinite patience would pay off. Daryl wondered about the boy sometimes. Beau would tell you anything you wanted to know about him, but Daryl hadn't asked him too many questions besides the practical ones.

Beau had seemed bothered by Dominique's death. Daryl hadn't talked to him about it directly, but he knew from Michonne that Beau had talked about it some with Carol. Apparently the whole situation had hit close to home for him, reminding him of losing his brothers in Walker attacks.

Daryl wondered if Beau felt responsible. He knew it was easy in those situations for people to blame themselves when they'd made it out and others hadn't. Shane was the only person that he'd known that had willingly sacrificed anyone else to escape a crowd, the entire community fully aware by now of what had happened to Otis. Everyone else still tried to fight until the end to save themselves, and to save each other, so each loss could strike you as a failure on your part. It was a moment when you let someone down. Daryl could imagine that Beau probably felt the same. He'd decided to deal with it by throwing himself into making sure that Carl acquired a new skill, perhaps even a skill that could save him, in some way, some day.

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Maggie, Rachel, and Sasha had gone collecting clothes for Michonne. Now Hope was crawling around the bedroom floor while Michonne sat among several boxes and bags that were overflowing with every kind of maternity clothes imaginable.

Most of them didn't seem right to Michonne as she was sorting them into piles, wondering what would fit now and what would fit later. They all seemed so clean, so fresh. A lot still had tags on them and had never been worn.

Michonne thought that she would have loved many of the clothes before, they were brightly colored, light clothes for the most part. The person that she'd been before all of this would have liked all the colors, all the prints, but now they just didn't fit. They were too happy, too _something_. It was hard to imagine wearing anything like this in a world where you might have to bash in the head of a Walker at a moment's notice.

Still, she wasn't exactly on Walker duty these days, and this was what she had to wear.

The clothes seemed a little cheerful when she considered that all the members of the group were, to some degree, in mourning, and a few were still deeply in mourning.

_How quickly it all passes, these days_. She thought. When she was a little girl, and her grandfather had died, she remembered her grandmother talking about mourning. In her grandmother's opinion, the proper mourning time was no less than a year. Her grandmother had lamented that people didn't respectfully mourn any longer, recalling to Michonne that they had gone an entire year after a loved one's death wearing black and restricting their activities. A full year. Now her grandmother would really be shocked at the way that people mourned. Death had become so commonplace that official mourning was sometimes limited to only a few minutes, perhaps a day or two if everything was in your favor. The rest of the grief that you had would have to be worked out here and there, when you had the time, and chances were you'd have another death to grieve before you'd worked through the entire process with the last loss you suffered.

_Everything is so much faster now._ Michonne thought. She looked at the relationships she'd formed with the group. Her love of Daryl was deeper than she imagined it ever could be, and now she realized how fast everything between them had really taken place. Her relationship with Carol was like the best friends that she'd read books about and seen movies about, but never really had growing up. They all became close quickly, and they lost each other just as quickly. Sometimes it felt that you barely had time to come to know someone before they were just someone whose name you could barely remember and whose face was even less strongly imprinted on your memory.

The only things that seemed to take the same amount of time as they always had were the children. Hope and Judith grew like weeds, but they grew no faster than any other baby had grown. Carl was sprouting into a young man, and the "kids" that they'd taken in were slowly maturing into the men and women that they would be. _And this one_, Michonne though, thinking about the baby she was carrying, the one that was forcing her to sift through bags and boxes of unknown women's forgotten maternity clothes, _this one is growing at exactly the same pace as all the others_. This one would take as long as it was going to take. It had no concept of the rapidness with which life outside its warm bed passed.

Michonne assumed she was somewhere around twelve weeks pregnant, remembering back to when she'd been pregnant with Hope, but there was no way of telling. She and Carol were crossing their fingers that she was about twelve weeks now, and using that as a reference point, in hopes to have even the foggiest idea when it came time to determining when they should be preparing for the baby's arrival.

"Michonne, you better come on, it's time to eat," Carol called up the stairs, snapping Michonne out of her thoughts.

Michonne hurried and dressed.

She didn't feel quite right dressed in the olive green khaki pants and the lavender top that she chose, again thinking that it felt to _bright_ for their situation, but it fit, and it was comfortable. She slipped into a pair of shoes that she'd found in the closet, thankful that the woman who had lived there had possessed both good taste and feet that were a little larger than her own. The extra room was nice in contrast to some of her shoes.

"Does mommy look silly?" She asked Hope.

Hope didn't respond to her, except to coo at her and stretch her arms toward her. Michonne sighed and scooped her up, heading to dinner.

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When Michonne walked into the room, coming toward him to pass him Hope, Daryl stopped for a minute. She looked vastly different to him. Michonne looked softer, more like the Michonne that lived in the photo album that she'd let him lay claim to, since he was the one that most often looked at it.

Daryl could hardly take his eyes off of her, not sure if it was the clothes, or the fact that she had her dreads tied back from her face, but struck by her, almost as though he were seeing her for the first time. He didn't miss, either, the fact that a few of the others were looking at her too.

After dinner Michonne excused herself and went back to the house early, claiming that she was tired, and still had a few things to do. She'd left Hope with Daryl, and hadn't expected him to follow immediately after her.

Daryl followed Michonne to the bedroom and sat on the foot of the bed with Hope while Michonne sorted through piles of clothes. It was obvious she was in a bit of a bad mood.

"What you goin' through, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked.

"It's just these clothes," Michonne said. "They're all wrong. They don't look like _me_. You had to notice everyone staring at me at dinner, or were _you_ too busy staring to notice? I know they look weird on me, but it's what was available. They didn't exactly make maternity wear practical for the end of the world."

Daryl snickered at her. "'Chonne, I was staring at you 'cause I thought you looked pretty," he said.

Michonne stopped what she was doing.

"What?" She asked.

"I thought you looked pretty, like you do in my picture book," he said. "I like them soft colors on you."

Michonne smiled at him, but she didn't say anything.

"I bet that's why everyone else was lookin' at you too, 'Chonne, it weren't 'cause you looked bad, it was 'cause you looked real pretty and we ain't been used to many of us bein' all that pretty these days," Daryl said.

Michonne didn't really know if what Daryl was saying was true at all, but it made her feel a lot better, for the moment at least.

"You really think I look _pretty_ in this?" Michonne asked.

"You look prettier than I've seen ya before, and I _always_ think you look pretty," Daryl said.

Michonne smiled at him, wholly pleased by the compliment.

Daryl smiled back at her.

"And you look even prettier wearin' my smile, 'Chonne."


	66. Chapter 66

**AN: Another short one in a series of short ones, but that's all I have to give right now. Sorry about that. I hope to have another short one, at least, out for you tomorrow. **

**As always, your reviews are greatly appreciated, especially when I have a lot going on. They're good motivation to keep going when I might otherwise not feel like trying to continue for a while. **

**I hope you enjoy.**

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"Have you seen 'Chonne?" Daryl called, dropping Judith off with Carol. He'd seen her at breakfast, but lost track of her since then. He'd taken Judith to change her, and then she'd travelled about with him checking to see what everyone else was doing. Now Daryl was returning Judith to Carol, but Michonne wasn't with her.

"She's down at the fields," Carol said. "She's on water duty today." She accepted the little girl from Daryl and put her in her playpen in the yard.

"You ain't lettin' her go on no water runs, are you?" Daryl asked.

"No, Daryl, but we needed a little break from one another and her and her mood needed to be on the other end of the community for a little while. She wants something active to do, and water duty isn't too physically demanding, so I'm letting her do that for a little while," Carol responded.

"Fine, I'm gonna go down there and check on her," Daryl said.

"I'm sure she's fine, Daryl," Carol said.

Daryl made his way across the community and toward the fields that were everyone's pride and joy. The promise of a harvest was upon them. Everything was growing, and every time anyone went down to the fields they were excited by the prospects.

He found Michonne watering, her wheelbarrow full of water buckets not far from her. He paused a little off, just where he was sure she hadn't noticed him, and watched her. She seemed to be enjoying what she was doing, apparently deeply lost in thought. Daryl knew that Michonne liked isolation, and the quiet provided by being the only one watering plants would be something that she would greatly appreciate. She emptied the can that she was carrying and walked back toward the wheelbarrow, picking up one of the buckets and carefully tipping it to fill the can again, returning it to its place and then going back to continue watering where she'd left off minutes before.

Daryl wondered if the lifting of the buckets might be too much, or the strain of pushing the wheelbarrows back and forth across the community to trade them out for other full buckets. He didn't want her overdoing it. He was pretty confident that Carol wouldn't let her do the job if it was too much, but he still worried.

"I can see you, Daryl, you're not hidden," Michonne called, not looking up from the line that she was watering a few feet off.

Daryl smiled and started toward her.

"I figured you might not 'a heard me come up," Daryl said. "You looked like you was daydreamin' pretty good."

"You underestimate me, Daryl," Michonne said, "I can daydream and still be aware of people approaching me." She looked up then and smiled at him.

"Sorry, 'Chonne," Daryl said, grinning. "Do you need some help?"

"No, Daryl, I don't need any help," Michonne said.

"Why don't you let me help you, 'Chonne, you don't want to overdo it," Daryl said, reaching out to take the watering can from her. She snatched away from him and shot him a look that he hadn't seen in a while. It was clear that she was challenging him to _try_ to take it from him. Daryl backed up a little, out of instinct. "Whoa, easy 'Chonne," he said, smiling.

"Don't talk to me like I'm an animal, Daryl, I don't need to be soothed," Michonne said.

Daryl smiled again. _So she's in one of those moods_. Daryl thought.

"I don't think you no animal, 'Chonne," Daryl said.

"I'm not going to overdo it, Daryl," Michonne said. "This really isn't that hard, you know." She emptied her can and started back toward the wheelbarrow. Daryl watched her lift the bucket up and refill the can.

"You could dip the can in there, 'Chonne, at least 'til it got emptier, then it wouldn't be so heavy," Daryl said, wrinkling his brow. The look returned to Michonne's face and Daryl tried not to smile, worrying that at that particular moment it might annoy her.

Michonne sighed. "The baby is fine, I'm fine, but I'm not going to be fine for too much longer. I can't take one more hour of mending someone's pants, washing someone's underwear, handing out soap, shampoo, and tampons…I just can't take any more of it without getting to do something _else_. I'm not Carol. I'm not domestic like she is. I think it's great that she's domestic like that, but I'm just _not_ that way. I can't _be_ that way and I feel like I'm going crazy right now!" She spat.

Daryl smiled at her. "I don't want'cha to be like that, 'Chonne, I know that ain't who you are, but I _do_ want'cha to take it easy, just a lil' bit, until we got us the baby here, safe and sound," Daryl responded.

"I'm watering plants, Daryl, I think I can handle that," Michonne said.

"I didn't say you couldn't, 'Chonne, I just asked if I could help ya," Daryl said. "You know, just me an' you down here workin' together for a bit. I can feel the cans for ya and you can go on waterin' like you been doin'. I ain't gonna tell you that you can't do it, just help you out."

Michonne growled at him, but a moment later she was smiling. Daryl was surprised when she splashed him with a shower of water out of the spout of the can she was holding.

"Hey now," he gasped, "Carol's gonna get ill with you down here wastin' water!"

He laughed at her.

"You can help me if you want to, Daryl, but just remember that you're the help and I'm the one in charge here. I can fire you any time I want if you try to get to big in your role," Michonne said.

"Fine, 'Chonne, you the boss!" Daryl said.

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"So who feels brave?" Carol asked, walking into the living room. Daryl and Michonne were lounging on the couch together with Daryl stretched out and Michonne leaning against him. Hope and Judith were playing in the floor. Tyreese was occupying one chair, and Carol had claimed the other to stretch across and read by lamplight for most of the evening. Now she was coming back from the kitchen carrying a box of something that she'd smuggled out of storage.

"What do you have?" Tyreese asked, trying to decide if whatever she had would motivate him to risk possible food poisoning.

"It's a box of Twinkies," Carol said, "unopened. Who wants to be the first to test the theory that Twinkies will outlast the end of the world?"

"I'll try it," Daryl said. Carol opened the box and threw one at him. He caught it and opened the package, taking a bite.

"Well?" Carol asked. "Does it taste bad?"

"Dunno," Daryl said, still chewing. "I ain't never eat no Twinkie before," he admitted.

"What's it taste like?" Michonne asked.

"Like a dish sponge filled with sweet caulk," Daryl said.

"I guess they don't change after all," Tyreese said with a chuckle.

"Give me a bite," Michonne said, opening her mouth at Daryl.

"Nope," Carol commanded.

Michonne shot her a look.

"Give him at least 30 minutes to see if he's going to get sick. The last thing you need right now is some kind of volatile Twinkie induced food poisoning," Carol responded. She got back in her chair, dropping the box on the floor beside her. "If he isn't feeling a little ill in about a half an hour, you're more than welcome to one, but let's let him test it out."

"I get to be the guinea pig," Daryl said, smiling. He really didn't mind. He knew that Carol usually took the job and it sometimes didn't end well. It had landed her in the bushes more than once. If she felt like taking the night off, he didn't mind covering for her. The spongy thing hadn't tasted bad, so he doubted that there would be much repercussion for testing it.

"So this book is pretty worthless," Carol said after a few minutes. She was slowly making her way through some of the stacks of baby books that Glenn, Maggie, and Sasha had brought her back.

"Why is it worthless," Tyreese asked. He got her to talk about what she read with him as much as possible, hoping that repeating anything she found helpful might cement it more in her mind and give her less to worry about when the time came.

"The whole first chapter deals with the fact that I'm supposed to recommend "natural childbirth" to the to the mother as the best option," Carol said, "and I'm supposed to provide her with all these convincing arguments as to why it's really the best option for her particular case."

Carol put the book down a minute.

"Michonne," she said, "I want to tell you that I think that natural childbirth is the best option for you, would you like me to give you some reasons to convince you of why I think that?"

Michonne smiled, "Sure, why don't you convince me that I don't want to go with some of my other options."

"OK," Carol said, "I think the strongest argument that I've got for you is that it's your _only_ option. Need I go on?"

Michonne shook her head. "Given your argument, I have to say that I am leaning toward natural childbirth. I think you've covered the first chapter. Is the second chapter as useless as the first?"

"Mmmm hmmm…it's even worse," Carol said, flipping through a few of the pages. "It's all about how if there's any trouble I should offer you words of encouragement but should avoid medical interference and let nature run its course." She tossed the book at the pile beside her. "To hell with that, I want a book that says 'So you suspect there might be trouble, what the fuck do you do now'," she said.

Everyone looked at her, frozen for a moment, a half smile and half surprised look on everyone's face.

"Carol!" Michonne said, smiling. She'd never heard Carol talk like that.

Carol smiled and blushed.

"Well, I'm sorry, but that's how I feel about it. I'm not interested in just sitting back. I mean I'll offer you all the encouragement you need, clearly, but I'm not just going to not do _anything_. I can tell you right now that I'm going to be doing everything I can, whether or not I have any indication it's going to be helpful," Carol said.

"I appreciate that much," Michonne said.

"We're all just going to be positive that it isn't going to come down to anything like that," Tyreese said. He knew that Carol was worried. That was no secret whatsoever. "I'm sure that everything is going to go just fine."

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"Hope's going to be walking soon," Michonne said when she and Daryl were settled into bed and considering going to sleep.

"How old is she, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked.

"I don't know exactly, Daryl, but I'm guessing she's got to be about a year old," Michonne said. Hope's vocabulary consisted mostly of sounds that no one could understand, but she had become very good at identifying Michonne as "Ma ma" and Daryl as "Da da".

Unfortunately this had led to a bit of problem with Judith, and one that Carol had confided in Michonne that she was worried about addressing. The fact that Judith heard these words coming so freely from Hope, and she'd seen how people responded, coupled with the fact that Daryl frequently slipped and called Carol her "Mama" had led Judith to begin to use "Mama" almost exclusively to call Carol, and she was frequently calling Daryl "Dada", though at times she used the phrase also to refer to Tyreese. Carol was worried that Rick would overhear her use of these terms and become bothered by it. Michonne had told her that she needed to just speak to him about it, since it was an issue that needed to be addressed, whether or not it was a little like rubbing salt into some of his wounds.

"I can't believe it's been a year since the first time I seen her, 'Chonne," Daryl said. He leaned up on his arm over her. "I mean it seems like she's still supposed to be such a lil' baby."

Michonne smiled. "She's still a baby, Daryl, but she's not a little baby."

It was true. The year, on the one hand, had passed quickly and seemed like only a matter of a couple of months at best, but on the other hand it seemed like it had been an eternity. So much had happened, so much had changed.

Michonne felt Daryl's hand on her stomach, pressing. He was anxious to feel the baby move, even though she'd told him he just wasn't going to be able to feel it yet. Though it was earlier than it had been with Hope, she was confident she'd felt a few flutters, but she knew that it would still be a little while before Daryl could feel anything.

"Not so hard, Daryl," Michonne said.

"Did I hurt you," he asked, pulling his hand away.

Michonne reached over and put his hand back.

"No, you didn't hurt me, but if you press too hard it makes me realize that I need to pee, and I don't feel like getting up right now. Just rub gently, you might even put me to sleep," she said.

He smiled at that and snuggled her to him, rubbing her gently then.

After a minute she pulled away from him and got up.

"Where you goin', 'Chonne?" He asked.

"It was too late," she said, putting her shoes on. "Now I have to pee. I'll be back," she said, getting up and leaving the room.


	67. Chapter 67

"Rick, can I talk to you?" Carol asked, approaching Rick and Rachel who were pacing around in front of the gate, waiting for Glenn and Maggie to return from a run that they'd gone on scoping out possible neighborhoods and such, having chosen to avoid the neighborhood where the accident had happened.

"What's on your mind?" Rick asked.

Carol looked at Rachel and then back at Rick.

"Could we talk alone, Rick?" She asked.

Rick looked at Rachel for a moment.

"Rachel, why don't you go take a break. Carol and I can hold the gates if they get back," Rick said.

Rachel didn't say anything, just nodded at him and smiled at Carol as she turned to walk away. Carol walked over closer to Rick and watched as Rachel walked off.

"What can I help you with?" Rick asked after a minute.

"It's about Judith," Carol said. She'd practiced this speech a few times in her head during the night, she'd practiced it over breakfast, and she'd practiced it while doing dishes, but she still hadn't perfected it and suddenly she couldn't really remember how she'd decided it was best to start it.

"What about Judith?" Rick asked. "Is something wrong with her?"

He had seen her at breakfast, sitting in her high chair eating what she'd been given, like everyone else. She'd seemed fine then, chattering away with whoever would listen to her.

"She's fine, Rick, nothing's wrong with her," Carol said.

Rick wrinkled his brow at her and shifted his weight, but it was obvious that he was going to wait for her to tell him whatever it was she had to say.

"She's growing up, Rick," Carol said. "I don't want you to be mad, but she's starting to call me Mama, and I don't want you to be surprised when you hear it. I didn't _tell_ her to call me that, Rick, she just started…"

Rick nodded a little, his face fairly expressionless. Carol wasn't sure if he was OK with the situation or he wasn't, he hadn't offered any words yet.

"Carol, I don't hold that against you," Rick said.

"I'm not under any illusions that she's my child, Rick, I always intended to tell her about Lori, when she's old enough to understand," Carol said.

Rick smiled.

"I know you're doing right by Judith," Rick said in a reassuring tone.

Carol loosened up a little, suddenly aware of the fact that she was tensed.

"But Rick, you've got to figure out what you want to do," Carol said.

"What do you mean?" Rick asked.

"Rick, she's not exactly clear on what…well, she doesn't really understand what _Daddy_ means," Carol said. "I think right now she thinks it's just another word for a man who takes care of her, or pays her some attention. She's not too old yet to learn that you're her daddy…if that's what you want her to think, but you're going to have to act soon."

Carol wasn't sure at all how Rick was going to react. They hadn't actually talked about Judith much, hardly at all since she'd been born and he'd been struggling with all of his issues surrounding Lori's death. Rick had been unstable for so long, reacting in the most unpredictable to ways to every situation, but now it seemed like he was more level headed, more reasonable.

"What do you think I should do?" Rick asked, cocking his head to the side, slightly.

"I don't want to tell you what to do, Rick," Carol said. "It's up to you to decide what you want to do. I just think that you need to do _something_ if it matters at all to you that Judith regard you as her father."

"I don't think Rachel is exactly ready to take over as Judith's mother," Rick said. "She doesn't really seem even that fond of having Carl around, and I'm not sure that I would be able to take care of Judith by myself."

Carol felt her chest tighten at the thought. She had already talked herself through this. If Rick wanted to take the girl back, then she would let him take her back. She had no ground to stand on when it came to the girl and she was aware of that. It was better if he did it now instead of prolonging this.

"I don't mind taking care of her, Rick, if that's what you want," Carol said. She was concentrating on trying to keep her emotions from rising up in her voice or in her face, "but if you want her to come and live with you that's fine too."

Rick looked like he was thinking about it, and Carol was also acutely aware that he was studying her for a moment. She hoped that nothing about how she was feeling was visible to him.

"I think she's better off with you, Carol," Rick said. "There's a reason that Judith thinks of you as her mother, and that reason is that you've done everything for her that you can. You've been a mother to her. I don't want to take that away from her."

Rick was quiet for a minute and Carol nodded, releasing the breath she'd hardly realized she was holding. She took another breath and stood there, watching him. He pinched the bridge of his nose, and looked away from her for a minute.

"That's fine, Rick," Carol said. "I don't mind taking care of her, I do love her."

"I know you do, Carol," Rick said. "I appreciate that, and she does too." Rick was quiet for another moment. "What do you think I should do, Carol? Just tell me what you think needs to be done."

"I can't tell you that, Rick, you've got to figure that out for yourself," Carol said quietly.

She could see on his face now that he was struggling with something. Maybe it was what was left over from the mourning he hadn't finished with Lori, maybe it was guilt at having abandoned his daughter for as long as he had, Carol really had no idea what he might be dealing with. She could imagine that Rick had a good number of things, of past actions or words, that he had to deal with.

"I just want you to do whatever it is that you need to do, before it's too late," Carol said.

"I don't even know if she's mine, you know," Rick said. Carol wasn't sure that he really meant for her to respond to that. He may have been thinking out loud, or he might have been searching for some kind of confirmation. Carol wasn't clear on what he expected.

"She's got your eyes," Carol said after a minute.

Rick just looked at her, nodding slightly, but not with any real conviction.

"She needs to know who her daddy is, whether or not it's going to be you or someone else. If you love her, and if you want to be her father, then you need to try to start making that somehow clear to her," Carol continued. "I know she's not mine, but it doesn't mean that I love her any less. I think we've come to a point where we define family the way we want to define it. Biology really doesn't matter anymore," she said.

Rick didn't respond, but he did look a little struck. Carol waited a moment and then quietly walked off, leaving him to think about what she had said, about what he wanted to do. She knew that Judith would be alright, regardless of what Rick decided about her paternity. If he chose to step up and try to be a father figure for Judith, then she'd be a lucky little girl with a father and more than enough doting uncles to take care of her. If he chose to remain outside of her life to some degree, she'd be fine since there was more than enough men in her life that seemed willing to fill the shoes that Rick would choose to leave empty. The call was up to him now, and there wasn't anything that anyone could do to push him to feel one way or another.

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Maggie and Glenn were a little later getting back than they'd originally anticipated, but it was still well before sundown when they came into the gates. Tyreese, Daryl, and Beau were nearby, having been putting away some meat they brought back from a short hunting excursion. Carol was busy readying dinner, and only glanced in the direction of the truck.

Maggie crawled out of the passenger side of the truck looking more than a little excited.

"Y'all need help unloading?" Tyreese called when Glenn got out of the truck.

"Yeah, a little bit. We got some stuff, but not too much," Glenn responded. "We got a surprise while we were out."

"What kind of surprise?" Carol called out.

"Peaches!" Maggie called.

"What?" Carol responded.

"We got peaches!" Maggie called back, going around to the back of the truck and producing a burlap sack. "We got a lot of them!"

Maggie trotted over to Carol carrying the bag.

"Where on Earth did you get peaches?" She asked, taking the bag from Maggie and examining its contents. The only fresh fruit they'd come up with since this whole thing happened was a few berries and such that they'd come across here and there. Nothing to be too excited about.

"There's an orchard. We ran into it by accident," Maggie said. "There were a lot of peaches that were ripe, and others that are going to be ripe before too long. It looked like there were other trees and stuff there, but I don't know what they were. They weren't ready and the place is pretty overrun with weeds and all. We got all the ripe ones that we could, but I think before long we need to go back and see what else we can get."

"Looks like we're having a good dessert tonight," Carol said smiling. "I can put away whatever's leftover tomorrow. We brought in a few things from the fields today too, it's not much, but it's a look at what's coming."

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"What are you doing?" Tyreese asked Carol. He had thought she was mending clothes, but she'd been working on the same pair of pants for the better part of the evening, her chair pushed up against the shelves that supported her lamp.

"Making something for Michonne," Carol said.

Tyreese looked at Michonne, who was sitting on the couch with her legs drawn up beside her, watching Daryl. He was crawling around on the floor with Hope, holding her hands and trying to convince her to let go of his fingers and stand without his support. Hope didn't seem entirely sure of the plan. She would walk all over the floor if he guided her there, letting her hold to his hands, but she was reluctant to let go of them.

Every now and again Daryl would use his thumb to gently push on of his fingers free from Hope's hands, first one, then the other. She would walk with him a second, one hand loose, and the other still clutching his other hand. Her face would be calm for a moment, until it dawned on her that one of her hands was unoccupied, and then she'd panic, grasping for him. He'd return both hands for a moment, let her get her confidence back, and then he'd use his thumb to push the other finger free.

"She's being very kind," Michonne said. "I told her that I didn't like a lot of the pants that they'd found, so she's putting one of the waistbands from some of the pants on a pair of pants that I do like."

"It's not that big of a deal," Carol said, "and they should stretch with you most of the way."

"What are you doing in return?" Tyreese asked. He knew the two women often did things on their own kind of barter system.

"She's agreed to can the attitude with me for at least two weeks," Carol said smiling.

"I'm sorry," Michonne said. "I said I was sorry."

Carol smiled but didn't look up from what she was doing.

"I told you, it's fine, I'm not mad, but I will appreciate the vacation from your attitude when I'm only trying to make sure you're taking care of yourself," Carol said.

"I agree," Daryl said, "You can keep watering crops, but you don't need to be haulin' the water. There's plenty of others that can be doin' that."

Michonne didn't say anything.

"Oh, and by the way, the deal also includes that she's got to can it with Daryl for two weeks too," Carol added.

Tyreese chuckled.

"She's got you tied now, doesn't she?" Tyreese said.

"It's fine," Michonne said. "Daryl's been at me for a couple of days."

"Actually," Carol said, "in all fairness to Michonne she apologized and agreed to not be as hard headed before I even suggested trying to solve her frustration with her clothes."

"Man, she could do this if she'd just let go a' both and trust herself," Daryl said, interrupting them.

Hope was clinging to one of his fingers and whining, having just realized again that one of her hands was free.

"Be patient, Daryl," Michonne said. "She's doing really well, but right now she still trusts you far more than she trusts herself."

Daryl smiled. He did like the idea that Hope trusted him like that, but he wanted her to understand that she was basically walking on her own. She was hardly even pulling on him, and he was certain that he wasn't holding her up at all. She _was_ walking, she just didn't believe it.

"Should I shuck both her hands at once?" He asked, looking nerviously at Michonne. "I don't want her ta think she can't trust me, but she's doin' it on her own, 'Chonne."

"She's using you as a security blanket," Michonne said. "Give her another day or so to try on her own, and if she hasn't started doing it on her own we'll do it a different way. I'll sit on one end of the room and you'll sit on the other. Then we'll put her down and try to get her to walk back and forth between us."

Daryl nodded at Michonne and continued his tour around the living room, leading Hope, with Judith toddling around beside him, watching every move that he made with Hope, asking him a variety of questions that he couldn't entirely understand.

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**AN: OK, so there's another little short piece to our tale. No worries, I've been doing a little planning and there's a lot ahead of us for those of you who are still with me. **

**On another note, I'm also working on some plans for some other Walking Dead fanfics. I'm certainly not giving up on this one, no worries, but I'm thinking there could be some others in my future. One that I'm considering doing is a collection of one shots or stories that consist of maybe only a few pieces. If you have any particular one shot that you'd be interested in seeing, AU or otherwise, feel free to message me with what you'd be interested in. If I feel moved by your prompt, I may actually write a one shot to go with it. **

**As I said, though, these are plans I have for possible future writing. I may start some of them soon so that my muse can play in various places depending on my mood, but please don't worry, I have no intention of abandoning this story at all. **


	68. Chapter 68

"I think you should check it out," Maggie said, standing on Daryl's front porch. Maggie and Glenn had gone out on a run right after an early breakfast and they had come back just as the group was finishing up lunch. Daryl had excused himself to take a quick nap on his couch, something he'd been looking forward to since he got out of bed. Judith had apparently randomly decided that she was entirely against sleeping, though she'd been sleeping through the night for some time. Her rebellion had kept Hope awake, against her will, most of the night and had roused most of the household.

Now his nap was being interrupted by Maggie, concerned about signs of others in the area that she and Glenn had run across. They were close by, Maggie had said, because she and Glenn had seen evidence of a fresh fire, and it hadn't been a half a mile from their camp. Then they'd seen another fire, not so fresh, some little distance from that. The group, however large or small it was, was moving in the direction of their community and she wanted Daryl to check it out.

"Fine," Daryl said, stretching and scratching the back of his head. "I'll go an' check it out."

Everyone else in his house was sleeping except Carol. Tyreese was napping on a pallet on the floor with both the girls. Michonne had retired to the bed upstairs. He envied them a little while he got his shoes on and grabbed up his crossbow.

"You seen Beau?" Daryl called to Carol as he was walking down the sidewalk, she was coming toward him, probably planning on joining the others in a midday coma.

"I saw him at lunch, but he left with Carl," Carol said. "Where are you going?"

"Got some people in the area, gonna go an' see if I can't find 'em an' check 'em out," Daryl said, yawning. "Gonna take Beau with me."

"Try over there where he's been practicing with Carl," Carol said. "I'm going to see if I can't get a few minutes of sleep, I'm dying."

"Yeah, everybody else is already dead," Daryl said, momentarily bitter again about his disturbed nap plans.

Daryl turned his steps and found Beau where Carol had predicted, working with Carl and his bow. Daryl watched them a moment. Carl was getting better. In the time that Daryl watched them he hit the target Beau had set up for him three times out of the five that he shot at it. They weren't bulls-eyes, but it was a vast improvement over when he was missing it entirely.

"Beau," Daryl said, finally interrupting them, "I need you to come with me, we got somethin' we gotta go do."

"Can I come?" Carl asked, turning with Beau at Daryl's summons.

"No, Carl, you can't come just yet. We gotta go check out some new people in the area and we don't know what we gon' run up on," Daryl said. "It'd be better if you stayed here. I don't wanna take no more people than we have to."

Daryl hadn't gone in search of a group before, but he thought that a larger number of people would be more alarming. If he took too many of the others with him, then the group, even if they were peaceful may feel threatened and feel they need to protect themselves against an imagined threat. He and Beau would go alone. The boy was quick on his feet, and he had the same general nature of a Golden Retriever. He didn't seem like a threat at all, which would be good when approaching strangers, but Daryl also assumed that for him to make it on his own as he had, the boy would probably be good in a tight spot.

Beau went for his weapons and then tagged along behind Daryl to Glenn's house where Daryl got directions to the general area where they had seen the fire. He decided they go on foot. They'd be more likely to find the apparently wandering group if they were searching the area on foot.

"How many you reckon we gon' find?" Beau asked when they were walking outside the gates in the general direction of the fire that Maggie and Glenn had spotted.

"How am I s'posed to know?" Daryl responded.

"You reckon they gon' be nice or you reckon they gon' be some 'a the rough'ns that I seen on the road?" Beau questioned.

"I don't know," Daryl said, irritated with the chit chat and his lack of sleep. "Shut up, we don't want 'em to know we're comin' because your voice carries over half 'a Georgia," he said, lowering his own voice in demonstration.

Beau kept quiet then.

"Look for tracks, let me know if you see anything," Daryl said.

Daryl was, himself, a very good tracker, but he'd also learned while hunting that Beau certainly lacked no skills where tracking was concerned.

They found the remnants of the fire, obviously burned that morning, without much difficulty.

"They went thata way," Beau said, pointing toward a small, slightly wooded area.

Daryl nodded, seeing the same prints that Beau saw. "Yeah, let's go," he said. Beau kept in step with him and they slipped into the overgrown brush, ducking a few tree limbs as they went.

At first Daryl thought that it was worthless. It was clear that the group that had passed through here had either been a very small group or they'd been walking single file. It wasn't hard to track them, seeing as the area was quite overgrown and the people who had passed had made no effort to conceal their passage.

He wasn't sure, for a moment, why he and Beau were slipping through the weeds and unruly trees in search of these people. Maybe they would show up at their community, or maybe they wouldn't, but now he felt like he was hunting them down. It was like they were some sort of game, and Daryl wasn't sure what they'd do with them when they found them. If they found them and they weren't friendly, they'd have to kill them, if they found them and they were friendly, they'd be stuck making an impromptu decision about inviting them back to the community.

The invitation to bring them back to the community wasn't really what was worrying Daryl. Granted he had some qualms about bringing in too many people, and it seemed momentarily odd to him that he could currently be _hunting_ more people to bring back, but that wasn't nearly as problematic as the other thought that fleeted across his mind.

If these people, the _hunted_, weren't friendly, they'd have to kill them. That was the law of the land these days, but what troubled Daryl is that if that happened, he could no longer rationalize it as they had before. He couldn't say that they'd encountered these individuals by chance, that they'd threatened them, and that they'd had to execute them because of the danger they posed. Now he was actually _hunting_ them. He would have searched them out to judge them and to execute them.

Suddenly this was a role that he no longer felt comfortable with. He decided it was best for him and Beau to return to the community. They knew someone was in the area, which was fair enough. They'd wait for them to come calling at the gates for admission into their space before they judged them. He wasn't going to be someone that encroached in another's space just to eliminate them. He wasn't comfortable with that role.

Daryl was just about to suggest to Beau that they turn back when he saw a woman, alone, in front of him, her back to him. He couldn't tell what she was doing. Perhaps she was picking berries, or maybe she was crouched down and watching something in the brush.

It was too late now. If they turned to walk away, they would undoubtedly startle the woman and they would have to confront her. Daryl didn't know if she was alone or not, but it looked like she was, and he wasn't comfortable with simply leaving one woman alone out here. He was smart enough, though, not to assume that just because she was a woman she clearly held no threat. He quietly reached his hand out, pressing the palm against Beau's chest and pushing the boy slightly back. Beau reacted as though he understood that Daryl was signaling him to remain silent and get back unless he was needed. Daryl held his crossbow down at his side, but kept it ready to use in case the woman should prove to be a threat.

"We don't mean no harm," Daryl said, announcing his presence.

The woman didn't stir. She remained crouched in her position, looking straight in front of her.

"You alone?" Daryl asked, wondering why the woman hadn't even turned to examine the men that were walking up behind her. "We ain't gon' hurt you less'n you give us a reason to."

The woman didn't stir. Daryl stopped a minute, confused. You didn't just ignore people around you. How did she know he was even being honest about the fact that they meant no harm? He could very well be walking up to cut her throat and she would be no more aware of it than a man in the moon.

"Hey, did you hear me?" Daryl called, walking a little closer to the back of the woman.

When she didn't stir again, Daryl began to get worried. He could really see nothing of the woman except her back, the back of her legs, and her curly hair cascading down her back, tied back with a piece of cloth. Maybe she was injured, or something else was wrong with her. Maybe she'd eaten something bad and was having some kind of poisoning episode. What was clear, though, was that she wasn't responding at all to Daryl's presence only a few steps behind her.

Daryl stepped forward again, reaching out and touching the woman carefully on the shoulder. At the brushing of his fingertips she suddenly swung around and into a standing position, and Daryl found a knife pointed straight at him. In an almost simultaneous reaction, Daryl had raised his crossbow, misjudging the distance between them. The arrow already loaded into the crossbow made contact with the woman, raking across her as he swung and pushing her back, howling.

The woman had dropped her knife and was clutching at her chest. Daryl swung his crossbow over his shoulder, immediately knowing that she had not been a threat to him, he'd merely startled her, but he _had_ been a threat to her, although accidentally. It was obvious she was bleeding, her hands wet with her own blood, and it was obvious that she was panicking too.

"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," Daryl clamored. "I swear I didn't mean to do it," he said. He wasn't sure what to do. The woman's cries sounded strange to him. He wanted to shut her up, though, scared that the cries would draw more Walkers than he wanted to deal with, and the fact that she was bleeding wouldn't keep them from finding them before too long anyway. He'd been the reason she was injured, and he wasn't willing to let her be eaten by Walkers because of it. As he moved toward her, though, she back up, understandably so. "I swear I didn't mean to hurt ya, I ain't gonna hurt ya no more," Daryl said. "You gotta be quiet an' I'll get you to someone who can help ya." He didn't know how serious it had been, he imagined that it may have been a little deep, but nothing life threatening if he could get her to calm down and let him help her. She wasn't responding to him, though, other than fighting to try to get away from him.

Daryl finally lunged at the woman, grabbing her, attempting to avoid catching her wound. He wrapped his hand around her mouth, pulling her back against his chest and held her until she stopped fighting.

"I ain't gon' hurt you no more," he said. "I didn't mean to hurt ya in the first place. I'm gonna get'cha patched up but you screamin' like a stuck pig ain't gonna get us outta here safe an' sound, you understand?"

In response she bit him on the hand, hard.

"Damn it!" He cursed, not moving his hand from her mouth for fear that she'd start screaming again. "What the fuck you go an' bite me for, I done told ya I ain't gon' hurt ya no more!"

Suddenly, from the direction that the woman had been looking, a man came bounding out of the thick trees and undergrowth.

"Don't hurt, please don't hurt her!" He called.

Beau, seeing that Daryl had his hands full with the struggling woman, yanked his tomahawk out of his belt and held it, prepared to defend Daryl from the approaching man. The man, though he wore a knife at his side, made no move for his knife.

As he came closer he held his hands up, he was carrying a large bag thrown across his shoulders.

"Please," he said. "I don't have much, but I'll give you whatever you want, just let her go."

It must have been that moment that he noticed the blood. He gasped.

"Oh my God, what did you do to her?" He made a move toward Daryl and the woman, Daryl's hand still muffling her cries. Beau matched him step by step and moved between them.

"I didn't mean to hurt her," Daryl said, "honest. I got someone that can patch her up. She drew her knife on me first, and sorta got in the way when I drew my crossbow at her. The arrow got her, but I don't know how bad, she won't stop makin' these God awful noises so I can see how bad she's hurt."

"Can you call off your assassin?" The man asked, his hands still in the air, eyeing Beau. "I'm not going to hurt anyone, all I want is Sadie. We don't have much, but I'll give you what we have."

Daryl could see the man was wide eyed. He didn't know anything about the man, nor about the woman that was struggling against him, not realizing that she was probably only causing herself more pain, not to mention more blood loss. The fact that they weren't surrounded by Walkers with the blood and the noise more than surprised Daryl. He kept casting glances from side to side, trying to listen over her muffled cries for the growling of approaching predators. He imagined for a moment what he would have felt if he'd come upon a similar scene and some strange man was holding Michonne, bleeding, in a similar manner. The fact that he man wasn't attempting to draw a weapon in any way clearly showed that truly his only interest in the moment lie in getting back the woman that had nearly chewed Daryl's hand in half from the feeling of it.

"Ease up, Beau," Daryl said. Beau responded by lowering his tomahawk and backing to stand beside Daryl, but it was clear the boy was still on alert.

"You gotta keep her quiet," Daryl said.

The man nodded, slowly reaching toward the woman. Daryl released her and she flew into the arms of the man. He pushed her out at arm's length.

"It's OK," he said. "You've got to be as quiet as you can. He says he can help you."

"Help me?" She asked.

Daryl thought her voice was strange. He could understand her, but she didn't speak like anyone that he'd heard talk before.

"Yes, he's going to help you," the man said.

"You alone?" Beau asked. "You ain't got no group?"

"No," the man responded. "We had a group, but not anymore. Now it's just Sadie and me."

"You can come with us then, I reckon," Beau said. "We'll get her patched up and you can stay with our group."

Daryl looked at Beau. Who did the kid think he was making invitations to stay? He'd get Carol to help the woman, since her injury was clearly his fault and he owed her that much at least, but he hadn't decided on inviting them to remain with the group.

Beau, however, had already considered the situation. They had said less than five people, and one woman and one man alone was clearly less than five people. For him it was settled. Sadie and her companion would join their group.

Daryl watched as the man dug in his bag, ripping up some clothes that he had in there and wrapping them around Sadie's torso. She pulled away from him and he pulled her face toward him.

"I know it hurts, but it's going to help with the bleeding," he said.

Daryl thought that he was clearly no doctor. He wasn't binding the wound well at all.

"Let me help," Daryl said, stepping forward. Sadie shied away from him. "I said I was sorry, ain't no need to be so skittish," Daryl said, reaching for another garment from the bag. He folded it up. "You need to put this directly over the wound, then tie your binding as tight as you can get it. It'll hold 'til we can get her back to our community and get Carol to take a look at it."

The man accepted the suggestion, reassuring Sadie from time to time of what he was doing.

When they started back toward camp, Beau and Daryl leading the way with the man behind them, his arm around Sadie, Daryl thought they could finally speak.

"My name's Daryl, and this is Beau," Daryl offered, hoping to gain the name of the man.

"I'm Mark, and you've met Sadie," Mark responded.

"I'm awful sorry, Sadie, but you drawed your knife on me an' I responded. I gotta be careful these days too, you know. If you'd been payin' attention then I wouldn'ta surprised ya. I tried to tell ya we didn't mean no harm," Daryl said.

"I left her there so she'd be safe while I was looking for food," the man said. "I told her she'd be safe there. Did you come up behind her?"

"Yeah," Daryl said. Sadie hadn't responded to him and he figured that she wasn't ready to forgive him just yet. "I told her that we didn't mean no harm, but she was daydreamin' or somethin'. When I touched her to get her attention she pulled her knife on me."

"She's deaf," Mark said.

"Deaf?" Daryl asked.

"Yeah, that means she can't hear," Mark said, clearly questioning Daryl's intelligence.

"I know what deaf means," Daryl said. He had never met a deaf person before. He'd had an uncle when he was a child that had been hard of hearing, or at least pretended to be, and everyone had said he was deaf, but it was clear that he really wasn't. "How come she ain't been got by Walkers by now?" Daryl asked. To him it seemed that if you couldn't hear at all these days, you were probably not likely to survive. If Sadie couldn't hear him and Beau approaching, how would she have protected herself if they'd been a couple of hungry Walkers instead of just two people hunting down the living in a thicket near their community? Daryl shuttered a little at the thought. _He'd hunted her down. He'd tracked her, frightened her, and injured her for no reason at all. The least he could do now was try to make sure that she healed._

"Walkers?" Mark asked.

"Walkers, the dead people walkin' 'round," Daryl responded.

Suddenly Sadie made a noise behind him. Almost as if on cue, a Walker rambled toward them. Beau, who was still clutching his tomahawk from having drawn it earlier, quickly took down the Walker. "You know, like that nasty asshole."

"She can smell them," Mark responded. "They can't sneak up on her, but you don't smell like they do so she didn't pick up on your scent."

"What the hell is she? A bloodhound?" Daryl asked.

"Of sorts," Mark responded.

When they got to the gate of the community, Maggie and Beth were on watch. "Go get Carol," Daryl said, taking out the four Walkers that were showing interest in Maggie and Beth and passing through the gates.

Beth trotted off and returned a moment later with Carol who looked puzzled at the scene before her. Daryl gently grabbed Sadie by the arm before she could protest and thrust her towards Carol a little.

"I accidentally hurt her," Daryl said. "You reckon you could fix her up?"

Carol wrinkled her brow.

"I can try," she said. "Maggie, can you help me? I'll take her into headquarters and have a look at her."

Carol started to walk off. "I'm Carol," she called back to Sadie, who stood frozen, watching Carol and Maggie walk toward the house.

Mark tapped Sadie on the shoulder.

"Go with them, they're going to help you," he said. Sadie wrinkled her forehead for a moment, then nodded and started after them.

"If she can't hear you then why do you talk to her?" Daryl asked.

"She can read lips," Mark responded. "As long as you're looking at her when you talk she knows what you're saying."

Daryl nodded his understanding.

"Beau, you can go on back to what you was doin'. I reckon we've done all the damage we need to do for the day," Daryl said. Beau didn't say anything, just jogged off down the street. "Come on, Mark, we'll go inside an' wait for 'em to finish patchin' up your girl."

When they got in headquarters it sounded like all Hell had broken loose. Sadie was screaming, Carol was yelling, Maggie was yelling, and there was a good deal of crashing.

"You need some help in there?" Daryl called.

"Yes we do," Carol called back. "She's exposed, but I'm going to have to have a man in here to hold her down. She's fighting like Hell and she's stronger than she looks."

Daryl laughed a little, looking at his own hand which bore a few places where her teeth had broken the skin.

"We might need both of you," Carol said. "I'm just trying to clean it up and she's going to need stitches. I need her still if I'm going to do this as good as possible with as little trauma to her as possible."

Daryl followed Mark into the already crowded kitchen. He tried to avert his eyes as a topless Sadie, sitting on the table, was locked into a wrestling match against Maggie.

"Beth," Carol commanded, "go see if you can find some sort of sedative in the medicine boxes in storage. I'm going to need bandages, too."

Beth gladly left the scene.

Mark explained to Sadie that they had to clean the wound and stitch it up and that he and Daryl were going to hold her, just so she'd stay still until Carol was done. Daryl took his position holding one of her shoulders down, trying to focus on her eyes and not the fact that she was fully exposed and he and Mark were pinning her to a table. He felt bad, pretty sure that this had not been how she'd imagined her day going, and it was his fault.

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When Carol had finally finished with the woman, the sedative that Beth had given her had clearly kicked in. Daryl and Mark had to switch from holding her down to holding her up so that Carol could properly bandage her. Beth had brought her some clean clothes, and Carol dressed her almost like a rag doll.

"Maggie's prepared you a house to stay in," Carol said. "You're welcome to customize it however you like, but at least it's a place for her to rest right now."

"Thank you," Mark said. "I appreciate you helping her, and I know she appreciates it too."

"She'll appreciate it a lot more when the trauma of some woman she doesn't know yanking off her shirt and sewing her up with a needle and thread wears off," Carol said, smiling.

"You need some help?" Daryl asked. Mark looked to be about Daryl's age, but he didn't look very strong, and Daryl doubted he'd be able to carry the unresponsive Sadie all the way to the house that Maggie had prepared, which was a good piece down the street.

"I could probably use it," Mark admitted.

Daryl heaved the woman up. She may have been stronger than she looked, but she was also heavier. Carrying her down the sidewalk he encountered Michonne, walking toward them with Hope.

"What in the world?" She asked, obviously surprised to see her husband carrying an apparently lifeless female down the street while a man she didn't know followed closely behind him.

"It's a long story, 'Chonne," Daryl grunted. Michonne followed behind to the house, and watched as he struggled to get up the porch stairs with the woman. Mark rushed ahead to open the door and Daryl slipped inside, Michonne just behind him. He accidentally hit Sadie against the doorframe and cursed. She stirred.

"Careful, Daryl," Michonne said.

"I reckon she'd be thankful if that was the worst that happened to her today," Daryl said. Michonne still wasn't sure what had happened, but her interest was piqued.

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"Sadie's about the kindest person you'll ever meet," Mark said over dinner.

Sadie was still knocked out, and Carol wasn't surprised. She was pretty sure she might have overdosed her a little on the sedatives. To be the kindest person in the world, she'd been a little like a caged tiger in the kitchen, and Carol had thought the only way to get out of the situation without becoming injured was to knock her out as completely as possible, momentarily having considered allowing Maggie to clock her with something.

"She sure seems sweet," Carol said. Daryl snickered at the tone in Carol's voice.

"Oh she's got a lot of fire in her too," Mark said, "but unprovoked she really is kind."

"She your woman?" Beau asked. They looked to be about the same age, and Mark was obviously worried about her, so Beau figured that there might be something between them. She was very pretty, so he wouldn't blame Mark if he'd laid claim to her.

"No," Mark said. "She's not my type."

Laughter rumbled a little through the crowd.

"Look around," Jimmy said, "it's the end of the world. Types don't really go for much around these parts anymore."

Mark chuckled a little and stabbed at his food. "Yeah, I guess not," he said, "but she's _really_ not my type."

Michonne understood the emphasis immediately, but was sure that most of the individuals that comprised her group wouldn't pick up on it. It didn't matter anyway.

"So you said you had a group, but you ain't got no group now, how'd you end up together without no one?" Daryl asked.

Daryl was relieved that at least Mark had accepted his apology, and he hoped that when Sadie was back to normal she'd accept it as well. He'd had second thoughts about letting them stay. In his opinion the deaf woman was probably just Walker food, but the more he thought about it, the more he fashioned that thought into a _reason_ for letting them stay. She might not make it when they moved on, but they could prolong her life at least by a while letting her stay there. It might make up for the damage he'd done today.

"Well, we didn't start out together," Mark said. "I was with my partner and a few of our friends when we started out of Atlanta. We ran up with another group and we all started trying to work together to survive. Sadie showed up sometime later with her brother, having lost her husband and children along the way. Our group had a camp not too terribly far from here. It got hit one day while I was out trying to scavenge food, and when I got back several of the men were dead, Sadie's brother included, and most of the women were worse for the wear."

"I bet those were the guys we killed," Maggie said suddenly.

"What?" Mark asked.

"We ran up on some drifters that were talking about killing the men off in a camp and having their way with the women," Maggie explained. "Glenn and I killed them."

"Could have been the same ones, I don't know. Sadie would be better at describing them. I didn't see them, but she got more than a good look at them," he said, his voice dropping a little.

Glenn hadn't seen this Sadie person yet, but he felt sorry for her. He felt, for a moment, a little better about having killed the men. If this Sadie was as kind as Mark was describing her to be, then at least he felt better knowing that he had killed the men that would take advantage of her, and kill her brother. Maybe there had been some justice served in the hardware store when he'd decided that these men didn't look like the kind of men that needed to stay around any longer.

"So then how'd it end up bein' just the two of ya?" Daryl asked.

"I guess it was about two weeks ago I went out looking for food again, and when I got back everyone was gone, except Sadie. She said another bunch of men had come through, apparently with the same ideas as the first, except that when they'd had their fun they'd taken everyone, all the women and children, except they'd left her behind. I guess they thought she wasn't worth taking."

"Walker food," Daryl said. He suddenly realized that he'd said it out loud, only really meaning to think it.

Mark nodded his head a little. "Yeah," he said, "I guess they thought she was _Walker food_."

"I'm sorry," Daryl said. "I didn't mean to say that."

"It's OK," Mark said, "just don't let Sadie know you think that. She's got a lot of spirit, and she's probably likely to outlive me in all this. I don't want people's negativity getting the best of her."

"That explains the old bruises, then," Carol said. She'd noticed the green tinted bruises on the woman's body when she'd been working on the gash that Daryl that given her. Carol knew what old bruises looked like, and she knew that those had not been the result of Sadie's encounter with Daryl.

"Anyway," Mark said, "when I saw that they were gone, I knew that it was just Sadie and me left. I didn't want to go in search of the others because I didn't want to put Sadie at more risk. Even though she's quite the…Walker killer, I guess…I didn't want her fighting against a band of men who had violated her, beaten her, and left her for dead. They'd probably shoot her just to be done with her. I knew I couldn't handle them alone either, so since then we've just been trying to avoid them and live the best we can."

"So do you know where they are?" Rick asked suddenly. He shot a look at Daryl and Daryl could tell that he was concerned. If this band felt it was fine to descend upon a camp, mistreat the women, and then take the people they wanted, there was no doubt they'd do it again, given the chance.

"Honestly I don't," Mark said. "I don't want to know where they are, as long as they're far away from me and from Sadie."

Daryl sat back in his chair, considering the possibilities. The band was probably close by, otherwise it might have been difficult for them to move the women _and children_ without having caught Mark's attention, wherever he had been at the time. They were going to have to be on guard, even more so than before, in case these people decided to show up in their own backyard. If they did come, though, they were going to get more than they bargained for. This was a group that he wouldn't have to think about. If they came, they'd be met with no mercy. He intended to call a meeting soon and let that be well known to everyone in the community.

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"I hurt that woman for no reason, 'Chonne," Daryl said.

Michonne sighed. She was exhausted, Daryl was exhausted, Judith was protesting bedtime again, Hope was sitting in the bed with them playing instead of sleeping, she could hear Carol desperately trying to get Judith to calm down and go to sleep, trying not to get frustrated with the little girl who had suddenly decided that sleep was unnecessary…she really didn't feel that much like dealing with Daryl's frustrations, but it was something that had to be done if she was going to get any rest at all.

"Daryl, it was an accident," Michonne said. "She's going to be fine, Carol said so. No one is going to hold it against you. Give her a couple of weeks of being here, feeling sheltered for a change, and she'll be _thanking _you for it instead of being angry about it."

"We went huntin' 'em down, 'Chonne. At first I thought they might be bad, you know, like that group that Mark was talkin' 'bout, and I don't know what I was gonna do, I guess I wanted to get them 'fore they got here to us, but they weren't bad, 'Chonne, and then I go an' do that to her," Daryl said.

"You were trying to protect us, Daryl, all of us. You were going to try to access the threat and handle it if you could. There's nothing wrong with that. That's thinking ahead in the world we live in. It just so happens that you ran into them, and it's a good thing you did. How much longer do you think they would have lasted out there on their own? Mark doesn't look like he could hold his own for too long in combat and Sadie has some pretty obvious setbacks when it comes down to it. In a way, you did them a favor. It would have been better if you could have done it without accidentally giving her a three inch gash, but accidents do happen," Michonne said.

"I shouldn'ta called her Walker food," Daryl said.

Michonne chuckled. "No, Daryl, you shouldn't have called her Walker food, although I think that the thought had crossed most of our minds before you even said it."

"Did you really think that too, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked. He was lying on his back and Hope had a sudden interest to crawl on him. He played with her a little, smiling when she lost her footing and dropped back onto the mattress, apparently trying to decide if she was bothered by it or not.

"I did, Daryl, at least to some degree. I mean it is survival of the fittest out there, and I don't know what kind of challenge it would be like to not be able to hear anything, but I can't imagine it would be an advantage," Michonne said.

Judith was quiet now. It sounded like Carol and Tyreese had retired to bed. Michonne wanted to go to sleep, but she didn't want to take Hope in there to her crib and risk waking Judith. She decided that Hope could spend the night with them tonight, and hopefully Judith would understand tomorrow night that bedtime wasn't suddenly a punishment.

"Let's try to get some sleep, Daryl. Stop worrying about today. You can't take it back, and you can apologize to her again tomorrow," Michonne said.

She kissed Daryl and rolled over.

"OK, 'Chonne, but Hope ain't sleepy yet," Daryl said.

"Well she can keep you company while you keep worrying," Michonne said. "I'm sure you'll be at it for a little while. Maybe you can worry her to sleep."

"Very funny, 'Chonne," Daryl said. Hope cooed at him and lunged forward, sticking her fingers in his mouth.

"Goodnight you two, I love you both," Michonne said, not turning back toward them.

"Night, 'Chonne," Daryl said. "I love you too."

Daryl was quiet for a minute. Michonne closed her eyes and started to become overcome with sleep, only vaguely aware of what was taking place next to her on the bed.

"Guess it's just you an' me, kid," Daryl said. It was the last thing that Michonne heard before she fell asleep.


	69. Chapter 69

**AN: So this chapter/episode is the first in "getting to know" the new people. It's focused mostly on Sadie. The next one will be more focused on Mark and dealing with the new issues that are going to be facing our friends as we continue on. **

**I hope you enjoy! **

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Carol was washing sheets and Michonne was keeping her company and watching the girls play in Judith's playpen, which Carol had lined with extra blankets. Hope had finally begun, a few nights before, to toddle between Daryl and Michonne on the floor. She still had the same general nature to her steps as a newborn calf, and she spent a lot of time falling back on her bottom, but at least she was testing out her legs a little. Judith, whether on purpose or not, wasn't too helpful. She would frequently bump Hope, knocking her down before her own faltering steps would have brought crashing back down. Fortunately enough, though, Hope didn't seemed bothered by the setbacks, and she actually cackled most of the times that Judith bumped her.

Sadie approached the two women, looking more than a little disoriented in her approach.

"Well, she's alive," Carol said.

Michonne laughed. "Did you doubt she was going to make it?"

"I'll be honest, I wasn't sure about all that medicine I gave her, but it looks like it finally wore off," Carol responded. "Are you hungry?" Carol asked Sadie as she approached. She knew the woman hadn't eaten in a while, and she wasn't sure how long it had been when Daryl had found her.

Sadie looked at her a minute, without responding. Michonne watched her. The woman in front of her was probably comparable in age to her, and she was very pretty, even if she looked exhausted right now and her eyes were a little sunken.

"Do you want pain medicine?" Carol asked. "Are you in pain? How does your wound look?"

Michonne watched the interaction for a moment and then caught herself laughing. She couldn't help it. She honestly couldn't control not laughing at the two women in front of her. Carol was growing visibly frustrated and Sadie's face sunk into a deeper state of confusion each time that Carol, who was almost yelling, asked her something.

Michonne had a few deaf clients when she was a lawyer, but she'd always been given and interpreter for each of them. The interpreter had eased any of the difficulties in communicating that could arise. Sadie, however, was now navigating her world without the aid of an interpreter, and Michonne imagined it could be frustrating.

Sadie finally walked over to Carol, put her hand under Carol's face and turned her face toward her.

"Talk to me," Sadie said. "I need to see your mouth."

"Do you want something to eat?" Carol asked, drawing out her words. Michonne snickered again.

Sadie smiled.

"Yes, I'm hungry. You can talk normally to me, it's easier to read your lips that way," she responded.

"I'll get you something to eat," Carol said.

"Thank you," Sadie said, gesturing at Carol. Michonne assumed she was likely signing the words as she spoke them, not fully thinking about the fact that no one in this group was going to have a clue as to how to communicate with her that way.

Michonne got up from her chair and walked toward headquarters, bring one of the extra chairs from the porch. Carol had slipped inside to gather up what was left of breakfast for Sadie. Michonne put the chair near hers. Sadie watched her, silent.

"Sit," Michonne said, pointing at the chair. Sadie did sit, thanking Michonne. Carol returned moments later carrying a plate and some water which she offered to Sadie. The woman took the food and was eating greedily before Carol could even apologize for the fact that it was cold.

"I guess she was hungry," Carol said to Michonne.

"Looks like it," Michonne responded.

Carol took her place then, returning to washing sheets.

"She's pretty," Carol said, making sure not to look in Sadie's direction. MIchonne took her lead, resting her elbow on her leg and resting her chin in her hand, making sure to slightly cover the movements of her mouth with her hand.

"She is, you're right," Michonne said.

"This could end up being a test of the loyalties of the menfolk of this group," Carol said, laughing a little.

"You think?" Michonne asked.

"Please, Michonne, _I'd_ sleep with her," Carol said, laughing again. Michonne responded with a laugh.

"I don't think Daryl and Tyreese would do anything," Michonne said. "Rick might be another story. I guess we could find out how dedicated he really is Rachel."

Carol didn't have many doubts in regard to the personality of the woman, but she realized that communication was going to be something that they had to work on and get used to. It wasn't going to be easy to remember that you had to speak directly to Sadie if you wanted her to respond in any way.

Sadie watched the two women, feeling a little uncomfortable. They were talking, and she was pretty sure they were talking about her. Both were making at least some effort to conceal the movements of their mouths. She wasn't any stranger to this practice, though, and she was sure that eventually the women would be more comfortable around her. When she finished with her food, the little pixie woman took her plate and offered her two pills. She looked at them and then looked back at the pixie, waiting for some sort of explanation.

"Pain medicine," the pixie explained.

Sadie nodded, hoping the pills weren't the same thing she'd taken yesterday. She had rested, and they had kept her from feeling the throbbing pain that she felt right now, but they had made her completely disoriented and had given her some dreams that she'd rather not repeat if it could be avoided. She swallowed the pills.

When Carol returned from taking the plate to the kitchen, she tapped Sadie on the shoulder.

"How does your wound look? Is it leaking?" Carol asked.

"No, I don't think so," Sadie answered. Honestly she hadn't thought to examine it. She'd woken up, a little confused and with no idea where she was. She'd been alone in the house, and she'd wandered around it for a bit, finding their bag in another room where Mark had apparently slept. Other than that, there was no indication of where she was. She'd gone outside and hadn't really seen anybody for moment, finally she'd began walking down the street in search of someone and had come upon the two women.

"I'll look at it later," Carol said. "I can change the bandage if it needs it. It shouldn't be too bad healing. It's a nice gash, but it isn't very deep."

Sadie smiled again and thanked her again.

"Um…your name?" Sadie asked.

"Carol," Carol responded. Sadie looked around for a minute and then pointed to the ground.

"Write it?" She asked.

Carol dried her hands again and smoothed some of the dirt near her, clearing out a little of the grass to make more room. She wrote her name carefully in the dirt.

"Carol," Sadie repeated. Carol nodded. Sadie pointed at Michonne and Carol smoothed the dirt back over her name. She suddenly realized that she had never written Michonne's name before and had no idea how to spell it.

"How do you spell your name?" Carol asked.

Michonne spelled her name for her and Carol wrote it in the dirt.

"That's nice," Carol said. Michonne snickered at her.

Sadie had a little more difficulty sounding out Michonne's name, but it was close enough.

Michonne tapped Sadie on the shoulder and the woman turned to her. For a minute Michonne felt a little taken aback. The intensity with which Sadie regarded her was one that she wasn't very used to.

"I'm sorry you got hurt," Michonne offered. "Daryl really didn't mean to do it. He's very sorry."

"Who?" Sadie asked.

"Daryl," Michonne repeated. "Can you write it for her, Carol?"

Carol obliged Michonne and wrote Daryl's name so that Sadie had a visual to go with it.

"This is going to take forever if I've got to write down everything we say," Carol said.

"Not everything," Sadie said. "Names are easier if I can see them spelled."

Carol blushed a little, not realizing that Sadie would have been able to read her lips on her last comment.

"I'm not mad at him," Sadie said. "I know it was an accident, or he wouldn't have brought me here. I didn't know it was an accident at the time, though."

Michonne nodded. She couldn't imagine what Sadie had been thinking with Daryl and Beau approaching her and then finding herself suddenly injured. If what Mark had told them was true about the various attacks on their camps, she wouldn't be surprised if Sadie was pretty deeply traumatized at this point. She did hope that Daryl proving that his actions were purely accidental would keep her from being anymore traumatized. There were a lot of men, a lot of people, out there these days that would hurt you simply for the sport of it, but Daryl wasn't that kind of man, and he'd been beating himself up about the accident since it happened.

"You have babies," Sadie said, looking toward the playpen where the girls were playing. They were squealing, but Michonne realize that the noise wouldn't have drawn Sadie's attention before. Carol quickly wrote "Hope" and "Judith" in the sand and tapped Sadie's leg. She gestured to herself and then pointed to Judith's name. Then she pointed to Hope and pointed to Michonne.

Sadie smiled. "I love babies. There were two babies in our group before the last attack," she finished.

"Speaking of babies, I need to give you some birth control," she said, starting to get up.

"No," Sadie said.

"Community policy," Carol said.

Sadie shook her head. "I don't need it," she said.

"I don't care if you're not with anyone, things seem to happen quickly around here," Carol said.

"No, I mean I don't need it," Sadie said. She made a cutting motion at Carol. "I got my tubes tied, after my last baby."

"Oh," Carol said. "I guess you're lucky, then, you don't have to worry about it." She went back to the sheets then, hoping to finish the task soon.

"It's easier," Sadie confirmed. "I never have to worry when something happens, like when the group was attacked. I knew I wasn't going to get pregnant."

Carol was quiet for a minute. Mark had told them about the other groups. Carol couldn't imagine, and didn't want to imagine, how Sadie had felt if she'd been one of the women violated in both attacks. Although she was sure there was very little comfort to be found in a situation like that, she was sure that knowing that you weren't pregnant, that you _couldn't_ be pregnant was at least some sort of comfort. Even after her incident with Earl, which seemed paled in comparison to what Sadie's group had apparently gone through, she had been a little worried about what she would do, how she would handle it if something like a pregnancy had come from it.

Carol felt like she should say something to Sadie, offer some sort of comfort, but she was completely at a loss as to what she might say. She just remained quiet.

Michonne, noticing the somewhat awkward lull in conversation, tapped Sadie.

"So you had children?" Michonne asked.

Sadie nodded. "Five," she said. Michonne and Carol both made a face and looked at each other. Sadie laughed. "I know, I know. My oldest was almost ten, and my youngest was six months old when we left Atlanta."

No one had to ask what had happened to the five chidren, and neither Carol nor Michonne would ask. If Sadie _wanted_ to share that information, she was welcome to, but they weren't going to drag it out of her. They _knew_ what had happened, they just lacked some of the details.

"Welcome to the club," Carol said, after having drawn Sadie's attention.

"Just two children?" Sadie asked.

"Well, there's Carl," Michonne said. "I'll write it later. We'll make you a list of names," Michonne said.

"Right now I wish we had a bunch of those tags we used to wear when I took Sophia on school field trips. You know, the ones that have 'Hi my name is' on it? Then we could just label everyone," Carol said.

"That would be handy," Michonne agreed. "There's Carl," she repeated, "but he's hardly a child anymore. Then there are the girls, and I'm pregnant." She realized that with the way she was sitting the little physical evidence of her pregnancy would be hidden from Sadie, so the woman wouldn't have noticed and might not have known otherwise. Michonne felt like she was at the stage in her pregnancy right now where someone could easily mistake her baby weight for just a little added weight.

"Oh?" Sadie asked. "I'm sorry," she said, her face very clearly concerned.

"No, it's nothing to be sorry about," Michonne explained. "We planned to have it."

Sadie looked struck for a minute and then nodded her head again.

"Then congratulations?" She said.

Michonne smiled.

"Thank you," she said. She realized that it would sound bizarre to anyone from the outside of the community to admit that they had planned a pregnancy.

"So you had five babies?" Carol asked after a second, slinging a little water in Sadie's direction to catch her attention.

"Yes," Sadie said.

"Don't let Daryl hear that," Michonne said with a chuckle. Sadie couldn't see her, and Carol snickered a little at her. "Of course she's only one up on me at this point," Michonne added.

"Did you ever deliver a baby, by chance?" Carol asked.

Sadie looked confused for a minute and Carol wondered if her angle had caused Sadie to miss what she was saying.

"I had five," Sadie repeated.

"I mean did you ever deliver any?" Carol asked.

"Oh, you mean me deliver a baby for someone else?" Sadie asked.

"Exactly," Carol answered.

"No, I was always on the giving end, not the receiving," Sadie said with a laugh.

"Darn," Carol said. "I was hoping we might have stumbled on a doctor or a nurse or something."

"No," Sadie said, "I was a professor, so I was a doctor, but not the kind that delivers babies. Sorry."

"What about Mark?" Carol asked.

"I don't know what Mark did," Sadie said. "But I know he wasn't a doctor. We didn't have a doctor in our group."

Sadie motioned toward her chest.

"I thought you were a doctor," she said. She looked confused and for a minute Carol had to make herself not laugh at her passing thought. For as deadpan as Michonne could be at times with her facial expressions, Sadie was the exact opposite. She had a million facial expressions, and they were so revealing that Carol was somewhat certain that she could carry on a pretty fair conversation with Sadie based entirely off her facial expressions.

"Nope," Carol responded. "Housewife. You entrusted your life to a completely clueless housewife, without even knowing it."

Sadie laughed.

"I don't think you are clueless," she said. "I didn't die, so it was a job well done."

"We'll see what it looks like when it heals before you start singing my praises too much," Carol said. Sadie laughed again. Carol knew that it was going to leave a very noticeable scar. Her stitching abilities were fair, maybe even above average for someone with so little official training, but they weren't good enough to avoid leaving scars.

"I'm sure it will be fine," Sadie said.

The women sat there in silence for a little while. Carol finished the sheets, hung them out to dry, and dumped out the water.

"I'm done here, ladies, but you're welcome to stay here if you want to and watch the girls. I've got a few things to get done," Carol said.

"Do you need help?" Sadie asked.

Carol smiled at her.

"I'll take you up on that offer when you're healthy. For now you can keep Michonne company and both of you can take it easy," Carol responded.

Sadie nodded at her, and she turned to start on the other tasks on her list for the day.

Michonne and Sadie sat side by side, watching the babies. Sadie didn't seem to feel the need to fill the time with conversation, and Michonne certainly didn't mind. She liked conversation when she was in the mood, but she wasn't the kind that felt that silence was a bad thing. She imagined that Sadie was even more so like that due to the fact that she couldn't hear. Michonne thought that maybe the lip reading and talking was even a little tiring for Sadie, so she decided to just sit there, watching the girls with the new woman by her side. She didn't know much about Sadie yet, but she already felt comfortable around her, and that was saying a lot. She felt like Sadie wasn't hiding anything, and that made her a lot easier to trust, and a lot more pleasant to be around.


	70. Chapter 70

**AN: OK, I hope this chapter makes sense/reads well. I tried to edit it to make sure but no one and nothing in my household has wanted to make that easy for me. The entire time I've had people watching television at the loudest possible level, dogs barking for no apparent reason, and other people walking around singing badly at the top of their lungs. Let's just say it's been a battle in concentration.**

**I hope you enjoy it, even if it isn't perfect. **

**As always, there's more to come. Please review if you feel so inclined. :-)**

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"So if everything we've been told is true, we know what kind of people we're dealing with," Rick said. "We can't just sit around and wait for them to attack us."

He was addressing the group, all of which were gathered together in headquarters.

"What do ya think we outta do?" Daryl asked. "We don't know where they are an' even if we did, what would we do, just show up an' attack _them_?"

"The way I see it, it's either we attack them or they attack us. At least if we attack them we're prepared, they don't catch us by surprise. We also know we've left the ones who can't fight safely in the community. If they come here we may not be able to protect everyone," Rick said.

"I don't like the idea of just attacking a camp," Tyreese said, "but Rick does have a good point. If they come here we risk losing more than if we go after them."

"There's one flaw, guys," Glenn said. "We don't know where they are. We don't even know _who_ they are. Mark said their group is mixed in with the other group, if we _did_ find them, how would we know who belonged to which group?"

"That's easy enough," Rick responded. "If they fight against us, they've turned sides and we have to treat them like they belong to the other group."

"No," Sadie said suddenly. Michonne had been scribbling notes from the conversation in a notebook that Sadie was reading over her shoulder. She'd decided it was the only way to give the woman a fair chance at participating in a group discussion.

"Excuse me?" Rick asked.

Sadie took a moment to read what Michonne wrote.

"Bad plan," she said. "They'll fight no matter what."

"Why would they fight us?" Daryl asked. "We don't want to do nothin' to no one that's willin' to behave themselves."

Sadie responded after a minute. "They don't know you, they don't know you don't want to hurt them. They've been through a lot. They'll fight because you might be worse than what they've got."

Daryl thought about it a minute. He had heard the horror stories that Mark had told them about all that their group had been through. Truthfully it made him feel as if his own group had actually been _lucky_ so far. They hadn't seen that many people and they'd had the good fortune of only encountering a handful of people worthy of immediate death, the Governor being the greatest of their threats. It sounded, however, as though the other group had not been so lucky.

"I reckon that makes sense," Daryl said. "They gon' fight 'cause they don't know what's gonna be worse for 'em, us or the group that's got 'em now."

"I suppose you've got a better plan?" Rick asked. Michonne tapped Sadie and let her know that she was supposed to respond.

Sadie nodded after a minute.

"We find them. I will go in, alone, look for our people, tell them we're coming. They can pretend they're going to fight, until we get there, then they'll turn sides and join us," Sadie said.

"Sort of like a spy operation," Maggie said, smiling.

"Cool!" Carl responded suddenly. "Sadie's gonna be a spy!"

"I don't think ya outta go in there alone," Daryl said. "What if they catch you? You won't have no way to let us know that you been got."

"I could go in with her," Beau offered, "be her backup."

"You?" Mark asked.

"Yeah," Beau answered. "I don't get seen less'n I want someone to see me. I could stay back far enough ta watch what she was doin' an' make sure don't no one get her. If'n they did, and I couldn't kill 'em without gettin' out, I'd come get y'all an' we'd go after her."

"Wait," Daryl said, "so we've already decided, unanimously, that the way to go about this is to attack this group that we haven't even found?"

Everyone just sort of looked at each other. It was evident on everyone's face that they didn't _like_ this idea, but it was about the most solid plan they had at this moment. Tyreese studied everyone and finally spoke.

"We don't like it, but it looks like that's what's got to be done," he said.

"How are we supposed to find them," Glenn said, raising his point again from before that they had no idea where this other group was located.

"Daryl and me can go scoutin'," Beau offered. "We start down by the creek, follow it lookin' for heavy foot traffic. Don't matter how big an' bad this group is, they gon' need water an' the more people they got, the more water they gon' need."

"Boy's got a point," Daryl said. "We could find 'em if we put our minds to it."

"Mark, how many people were in your group when they took them?" Rick asked.

Mark thought for a moment.

"I don't know for sure, Rick, we've picked up and lost so many along the way. There were two babies, two young kids, and there were probably about ten women left after last attack before they took them, so I guess there were about nine women they took, since they left Sadie behind," Mark responded.

"That's a hell of a lot of people," Rick said. He looked at Daryl.

Daryl could read his look. Taking in 13 people, especially when they were just women and children, and possibly wouldn't be the greatest additions to their numbers, did seem like a lot, but he didn't think he could very well tell Mark and Sadie that what was left of their old group would just have to make do elsewhere. He would have to think about this, think about what to do with such a large addition, but as it stood he could see no way around it, assuming that all of them had even survived to this point.

When Rick could see that Daryl wasn't going to respond to him, he pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed.

"OK, so Beau and Daryl are going to find the camp. Are we really going to try to send Sadie in there alone? I mean that just doesn't seem like a very well thought out idea," Rick said.

"Well, she's the only one that they'd know," Tyreese offered, "or Mark."

"Sadie's really the better option," Mark said. "She's quick on her feet, and she's better than me at sensing trouble."

"Yeah she seemed real good at sensing trouble the other day," Daryl said.

"She wasn't on guard, and that was my fault. I thought she could let her guard down. We hadn't seen anybody at all for a while. I didn't expect you two to be wandering around in the woods," Mark responded.

"So once we find the camp and Sadie slips in to warn her people, what happens next?" Glenn asked. If they attacked at dawn or at dusk, they'd run the risk of losing people in the battle as well as losing people to Walkers. Neither were great hours to be roaming around outside the protection of the community.

Daryl shrugged, "I reckon we pick us a day an' we attack. Once we know where they are an' what kinda protection they got we can better figure out exactly how we wanna go at 'em."

"Glenn and I could do a sweep for ammo and guns over the next few towns. I think we got most of it, but we can make sure we didn't leave any behind," Maggie offered.

"I can start doing some target work with anyone who needs a refresher course," Rick said. "We need to be prepared to shoot as well as to fight hand to hand, and that means any of you who feel like you need to brush up a little on your handheld weapons are welcome to go out and find yourselves a few Walkers to practice on."

Rick surveyed the group. He sighed a little and wrinkled his brow.

"What's wrong, Rick?" Tyreese asked after a minute.

"I was just thinking that we don't know how everyone is going to fare in combat. A lot of us have never fought together before," He responded. "Don't take this wrong, Michonne, but I sincerely wish you weren't pregnant right now."

Michonne would have offered to fight, maybe holding back a little until she saw how the conflict was shaping up, but she knew perfectly well that Daryl and Carol wouldn't hear of it and she didn't feel like arguing with both of them right now. Besides, she didn't know how long it would take for them to find the group, get Sadie to infiltrate it, and then to plan their attack. She might not feel as able to handle combat then as she did right now.

"That takes out one of our strongest members," Rick said. "On top of that we'll need to leave Carol behind, and probably Beth."

"Why me?" Beth asked. "I can fight too, even Michonne said I did a good job against Walkers."

"That's true, Rick. When she's pushed she steps up," Michonne said.

"Maybe so, but if we come back with injured people Carol is going to need help," Rick responded. "I know that Sadie and you will be here, but she might need another set of hands. We don't know what will happen when we decide to open attack on this group."

"I'm fighting," Sadie said, reading over Michonne's shoulder. "Michonne can't fight, I will fight for her."

Rick snorted. "Now we're supposed to take Nell here into a battle?"

Michonne rewrote the comment, leaving out Rick's insult. There was no need for Sadie to be insulted simply because Rick was stressed about the new group and behaving badly because of his stress.

"Why can't I fight?" Sadie asked.

"Do you really think that's a good idea, Sadie? We wouldn't be able to protect you," Rick said, annoyed. Michonne was glad that his annoyance wasn't apparent in her scribbles in the notebook.

"Who said I needed you to protect me?" Sadie asked.

"Sadie's actually a good fighter," Mark said. "She really took care of me out there more than I took care of her. I'd be a better choice for staying here with Carol to get things ready. I was a volunteer EMT before all this happened, I could help with the people you bring in."

"You were a volunteer EMT?" Carol asked.

"Well, yeah," Mark said. "I had a business too, I ran a furniture store, but in my free time I volunteered."

"I thought you said he wasn't a doctor!" Carol said to Sadie. Michonne wrote it and tapped Sadie on the knee.

Sadie shrugged. "He isn't a doctor."

"No, don't get me wrong, I'm not a doctor," Mark said, "but I do have practice with how to respond to medical situations. My job was more along the lines of keeping people alive until someone who could fix their problem was available. I'm not much of a fighter, though, so I'd be better at helping Carol than I'd really be at keeping anyone from getting killed in a tight situation."

"I need him," Carol confirmed. "Any help that I can get from him is more help than I had before. Rick, if you all come back injured, I can't promise that I can handle everything. I really don't know what I'm doing if anything is serious. Any insight he might have to offer could be the difference between losing someone and not losing them. It's better to keep him safe here than to risk losing him in battle."

Daryl nodded his understanding, whether or not Rick wanted to hear what Carol said. He didn't think that Mark looked like there was much to him, and if he could be of any use to Carol in regard to whatever medical emergency they may have, he was more than willing to let him remain behind. He wasn't entirely sure what he thought about taking Sadie out to fight, but she seemed determined to go, and Daryl knew by now how difficult determined women could be about things.

"Mark will stay behind. Sadie, you can fight, but it's your own ass if somethin' happens," Daryl said.

Sadie giggled at him after reading his message.

"It's my ass," she said. "I understand."

"We need to make a hospital run," Carol said. "Mark, you need to help me figure out what we might need. We've got to anticipate the possible injuries that we could see. I've got some bandages and stuff here, but they're more for dealing with flesh wounds and minor injuries, nothing substantial."

"I hope we don't have to deal with anything too serious," Mark said, "I'm not going to be a huge help if there's something serious."

"You're better than nothing, Mark," Carol responded. "Everything I do is pretty much out of blind instinct. We'll get ready, though, a hospital run can give us an edge for whatever we've got to take care of. At least we'll have more equipment."

"A hospital run is really risky, though," Glenn said. They purposefully avoided ever raiding hospitals. They'd tried to raid one and discovered that they were overwhelming hotbeds for Walkers. They'd barely made it out alive, less likely with anything worth scavenging.

"If you don't want to do it," Carol said, "I'll go, but I am going to need tools and equipment. I don't even think I have the necessary equipment to remove a bullet."

Carol had Hershel's bag, in which he had only packed the bare essentials, assuming they would find a place for a hospital run when they got settled, and she had quite a few first aid kits. She _knew_ she wouldn't be prepared for anything serious, and the idea of her family going out and starting an attack on a group made her stomach churn. The comfort of knowing that Mark might be of any help at all made it a little better, but she was still afraid of what could happen. They had no idea, at least until they scoped it out, what size group they would be dealing with. She had no idea how many people they could lose, or how many would return injured, and then the blood would be on her hands if they lost anymore.

Glenn looked worried. "You can't go on a hospital run _alone_, Carol. You'd be killed before you even knew what happened. We'll go, and we'll take a small group," he said. He didn't make any effort to hide his concern.

"Fine," Daryl said. "That's enough for tonight. It's getting late and everyone needs some rest. Carol, you and Mark figure out what you need. Maggie and Glenn, first thing tomorrow morning you're to start a weapons sweep for ammunition, guns, and anything else you think might be useful. Beau and I will head out first thing to start looking for this camp. Until we find it, everyone can start practicing and brushing up, and later you can make a run for whatever supplies you can get from the hospital."

Everyone started to shuffle around, acknowledging their roles, some chatting among themselves. Michonne hung back, waiting for the room to clear a little, her eyes locked on Daryl. He looked worried, and she didn't have to ask why.

Mark had gone to sit beside Carol, the two probably already beginning to chat about what they might have to deal with when and if the group went to war against the other group. Rick was shuffling around, waiting to speak to Daryl.

"Thank you," Sadie said. Michonne felt her squeeze the back of her arm.

"No problem," Michonne said, handing Sadie the pencil and notebook. "Are you really OK with going in there alone?"

"No sweat," Sadie said, flashing Michonne a big smile. "I hope I can fill your shoes fighting."

Michonne smiled at the woman. She hadn't known her for very long, but Sadie had a way of making you feel like you'd known her forever.

"I'm sure you will," Michonne said.

Sadie made another face. "I'm tired, I am going to get some sleep," she said. "You should do the same. You look tired and babies can take a lot out of you. Believe me, I know."

"I'm just waiting on Daryl and then I'm going to bed," Michonne said.

"OK, well goodnight," Sadie said. She reached out and squeezed Michonne's arm again, throwing her another bright smile and heading out of headquarters.

Michonne watched as everyone slowly made their way out the door and toward their respective homes. Carol and Mark split company as well, and Michonne watched as Tyreese, carrying Judith with one arm, slipped the other around Carol and led her out of the house.

Daryl was finishing up a discussion with Rick that was taking place in a low voice. Michonne wasn't entirely sure if they were talking quietly because they didn't want to be overheard, or if Daryl had requested that they do so because Hope was sleeping against him. He'd taken responsibility for her during the meeting so that Michonne could be free to write the interactions for Sadie.

When the two of them broke apart, Rick left without a word to Michonne. Daryl turned to her, looking both worried and tired.

"You ready?" He asked.

"I was just waiting on you," she responded.

"Let's go," he said with a sigh. "I'm beat, 'Chonne."

"I bet you are, Daryl," Michonne said, starting out the door with Daryl just behind her.

"Looks like we goin' back to war, 'Chonne," Daryl said.

"That's what it looks like," Michonne responded, making her way toward their home.


	71. Chapter 71

Michonne was up far before daybreak for a bathroom break, and when she came into the room, she found that Daryl was awake and waiting for her.

"Come 'ere," he growled. She could hear the sleep in his voice. He wasn't entirely awake, but he was working on it and it was clear that he had ideas.

Michonne sauntered toward him, stripping off her clothes as she walked. When she reached the edge of the bed Daryl got up. He grabbed her shoulders, turning her around and gently tossed her backward onto the bed. Michonne tried to suppress the laugh that threatened to escape.

Michonne lie still for a minute, while Daryl fumbled over the side of the bed coming up with the robe that she'd shucked off only a moment before from her bathroom run. It had actually been one that she'd brought for him, but she liked it, and he never really used it. He quickly unthreaded the belt from the loops and collected her hands together, quickly tying her wrists. She raised an eyebrow at him, willing herself not to smile.

Michonne didn't really know what she was supposed to do, what he _wanted_ her to do, so she waited patiently for some sort of instruction from him. He crawled around behind her and she suddenly felt him loop his arms through hers, dragging her backwards. Michonne decided not to complain. When he tied her arms to the bedpost, she stifled another laugh when he tucked a pillow under her head. It was a little difficult to bear in mind the seriousness with which he was trying to go about this with him being so _thoughtful_. That was Daryl, though. Even when he wanted to play some kind of tough role with her he couldn't completely abandon his almost impulsive need to take care of her.

"Pick your ass up," Daryl said. Michonne lifted herself with her legs as best she could while Daryl continued fumbling around, preparing the scene he'd apparently seen in his head while she was outside. "OK, you're good," Daryl said. She lowered herself and realized that he'd tucked another pillow underneath her lower back. Michonne turned her face into her arm, stretched beside her head, in order to hide her smile.

"This OK, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked, leaning over her and looking concerned for a moment.

"Daryl," Michonne said, softly, "I'm just going to say this once. It takes some of the fun out of it if I've got to reassure you. If I didn't want you to do something to me, I wouldn't let you do it."

Daryl nodded slightly and responded by kissing Michonne deeply, one hand trailing down to her breasts and rolling her nipple roughly between his fingers. She responded by moaning into his mouth. He kissed her jaw and made his way down her neck, nibbling her skin lightly. She knew that he knew he was driving her crazy.

He continued to knead her nipples, first one and then the other as he bit and sucked at her neck and collarbone, stopping a second to place a kiss just below her collarbone, the spot where she knew the scar from her gunshot wound was located.

Michonne closed her eyes and swallowed hard, attempting to block out every thought except those surrounding what he was doing to her. She could already feel herself building toward an orgasm, and she knew Daryl well enough to know that he would consider this the "just getting started" point.

When his mouth replaced his fingers at her breasts, biting gently at her nipples, Michonne cried out involuntarily with pleasure. He paused a minute, but settled back in before Michonne could protest his pause. She was thankful that just this once he wasn't attempting to have some sort of random conversation at intervals to drag her away from reveling in the pleasure she felt coursing through her body.

Daryl worked his mouth down Michonne's body, licking and biting. He was listening to the moans and whines that were escaping her. He had stopped once or twice to see if they were genuinely of pain, or if she was enjoying herself. The fact that she had her eyes closed, her mouth half open except when she was biting her lower lip, and the fact that she kept squirming beneath him made him fairly sure that she was enjoying herself.

Michonne was screaming at Daryl in her head, as she often did, to relieve her from her build up. She started to move and realized that he had her hands tied. He had done it just to keep her from taking care of things herself. They were pretty tight, too. She could get out if she really needed to, but it wasn't worth the effort right now.

Daryl paused at her belly, kissing her, licking her, and she thought she'd explode when she felt his hand drop to pleasure her exactly as she'd been thinking of doing herself. As he dug two fingers into her, his thumb doing its job from the outside, Michonne ground the best she could against him, raising herself up with her legs.

Daryl stopped for a moment and Michonne let out a sound somewhere between a whine and a whimper. He repositioned himself and moved between her legs, nibbling at the delicate skin there, lapping at her. She involuntarily jerked away from him, riding out the pleasure, and he grabbed her by the waist roughly, pulling her back where he wanted her.

"Don't run away from me, woman, I ain't give you permission for that!" He said.

He returned to what he'd been doing before, holding her waist tight to prevent her from jerking away from him. He didn't stop until she'd rode out her orgasm, cursing at him, though he knew that all her curses at this moment were actually _positive things. _

She was still panting from the wave of pleasure when Daryl finally thrust into her, hard, pulling her knees up over his shoulders. He smiled at the fact that she still hadn't opened her eyes and silently congratulated himself before continuing to reach his own release, and with any luck, to bring her to another.

Michonne only realized again that her hands were tied when she felt Daryl tugging at the knot on the belt, freeing them. When she was free, he dropped back down beside her, supporting himself on his elbow and smiling at her. She rolled her eyes in his direction first and then turned her head slightly, stretching her shoulders. She couldn't help but smirk at the grin he had on his face.

"Proud of yourself?" She asked. His grin broadened.

"You're welcome," he said.

Michonne smiled at him.

Daryl trailed his hand to her belly and started rubbing it gently. He was impatient to be able to feel the baby move, but Michonne knew it wasn't time yet. He'd have to wait it out a little longer.

"Daryl," Michonne started when her breath had returned to normal, "when you and Beau go out there today, don't act like heroes. If you find that other group, don't try to do anything on your own."

"We weren't goin' to, 'Chonne, we just gon' find the group an' then we'll come back here so y'all can know where they are. We gon' send Sadie in before anyone does anything," Daryl responded.

"I know that's the plan, Daryl, but I know that you can be a little impulsive and Beau's got a streak of that too. I just don't want you two trying something and getting in deeper than you can handle," Michonne said.

"Ain't nothin' to worry 'bout, 'Chonne, we just goin' to find 'em," Daryl said.

"I'm always going to worry, Daryl, when you go out there alone," Michonne said.

"I won't be alone, 'Chonne, I'm takin' Beau," Daryl said.

Though Michonne had confidence in the boy's skills, and she had an almost infinite amount of confidence in Daryl's abilities, she didn't like the idea of the two of them going out into the woods alone, looking for a group that may be violent simply because they noticed the two of them. She couldn't imagine what the group might do to them if they tried some sort of attack without back up.

"Just promise me, OK?" Michonne asked.

Daryl responded by leaning over and kissing her.

"I promise, 'Chonne. You don't worry none, we'll both be home in time for supper, you just make sure Carol don't skimp on the food 'cause we'll probably work up a good hunger roaming 'round in the woods tryin' to find these people," Daryl said.

They were both quiet for a few minutes.

"Speakin' of food," Daryl said, "how 'bout we go an' see if Carol's got breakfast for us?" He threw a leg over Michonne, meaning to crawl over her and get off the bed on her side.

"I love you," she said, reaching up and catching him around the neck, pulling him down to kiss her again.

"I love you too, 'Chonne," Daryl said when they'd parted.

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After breakfast everyone was scrambling about. Maggie and Glenn were preparing to go out sweeping the surrounding areas for added protection for their upcoming battle. Rick had taken a handful of the younger members of the group onto a neighboring street to start working with them on target practice, and Beau and Daryl were about to head out to go in search of the other group. Michonne had left Hope playing with Judith and followed Daryl around while he was finishing his preparation.

Each of them took a bag of food that Carol had packed for them and a canteen of water. Michonne and Carol both followed them over to the fence where Beth was keeping a halfhearted watch.

At about the same time they all noticed Sadie outside the fence. Her knife and her machete were hanging from her belt, and in one hand she held part of a length of rope and in the other she held a pitchfork.

"What the hell is the crazy bitch doin'?" Daryl asked. There were two walkers coming right at her, and she didn't look like she was preparing to take them out at all.

"I don't know," Carol responded. "She didn't say. She just asked if she could have the stuff the she found and I told her she could. I didn't even know what she had."

They all stood watching her for a minute. She waited patiently as the closest Walker approached and she stabbed it through the middle with the pitchfork, holding it away from her. She kicked her leg out, snatching the Walker's feet from under it and sending it dropping backwards. Quickly she reached down and tied the rope around the Walkers leg. As she heaved the pitchfork up, the Walker rose with it, and she finally snatched the pitchfork out, stepping several steps away from the Walker. He quit moving forward at that moment, having reached the end of his rope. It was only then that Michonne paid attention to the fact that all the fence Walkers that were trying to get through at the gate were actually tied together in a similar fashion and tied to the fence.

"She's collecting Walkers," Michonne said after a minute.

"What would anyone want to collect Walkers for?" Beau asked.

"I don't know that," Michonne said, "but I'm sure I'll find out."

Daryl sucked his teeth. Sadie was a character that he didn't understand at all.

"Come on, we better get a move on," he said to Beau. He kissed Michonne gently, squeezing him to her with one arm and releasing her quickly, and then he started toward the gate that Beth already had open, Sadie insuring that no Walkers made it through.

"Be careful not to distract her," Michonne called, watching Sadie repeat the routine with another Walker, "one wrong move could be bad."

Daryl gestured at her and the two of them slipped out the gate, moving away from Sadie's growling chain of Walkers and toward the creek where they would begin their search of the other community.

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Michonne and Carol had stopped a few minutes with Beth to watch Sadie's repetitive actions with the Walkers. When she had about twenty tied together, she tied the extra rope to the fence and came back through, panting and covered in sweat and Walker mess.

She stopped in front of the two women, fanning herself. She smiled for a second and made a face to indicate that she was tired.

"Tired," she said, smiling again.

"What are you doing collecting Walkers?" Michonne asked.

Sadie cocked her head to the side a moment and then smiled.

"Practice," she said.

"You practice collecting Walkers?" Michonne asked.

Sadie giggled.

"No! Practice for the others. It's safer in here, no chance of them bunching up on us. We take them somewhere else," Sadie looked around the community and then shrugged, "some other part of the area. Then we bring the others and let them go one at a time. Hands on practice, training."

Michonne smiled at the woman. That was actually not a bad idea. It would create similar conditions for the training that she'd done with Beth. It would at least give them an idea of how the newer members would fare against Walkers since they'd never seen many of them in that situation.

"That's a good idea," Michonne said.

Sadie made the gesture that Michonne now recognized as "thank you" and smiled again.

"Are you crazy?" Carol asked. "I can tell she is, but are you, Michonne? She wants to bring Walkers _inside_ the community. What if they get loose? I know they're hobbled right now, but what if Sadie isn't exactly the Boy Scout she thinks she is at tying knots?"

"It's not crazy, it's genius," Michonne said. "It'll give everyone some hands on training with their weapons and a chance to brush up a little." Michonne turned to Sadie, "I'll get my katana, you go and start rallying the others for training."

Sadie nodded but didn't leave immediately.

"Your katana?" Carol asked.

"Yes, Carol, my katana," Michonne said.

"Michonne," Carol started.

Michonne held her hand up.

"Don't start, Carol. I'm just going to be there to back up some of the others, so that if they hesitate I can take the Walker out before it gets to them. There's only maybe twenty Walkers on that chain. Even if they all got loose, with my reflexes, and apparently with Sadie's, we could have all of them down before either of us broke a sweat. There's no possible way for me to overdo it just by working with some of the others," Michonne said, her tone of voice leaving little room for argument.

Sadie watched the interaction, but didn't intervene in any way. She finally turned and started down the road in search of people to train.

"Fine," Carol said, realizing that there wasn't any reason to argue with Michonne at this point.

"I'll be fine, Carol. I promise. I'll take a break if I even feel so much as winded," Michonne said.

Carol nodded and turned toward headquarters. Michonne jogged toward the house to bring her katana out of hiding, excited at the prospect of holding it in her hands again.

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"Looks like they ain't even tryin' ta cover their tracks," Beau mused.

"We don't cover ours," Daryl said.

They were both staring down at such a cluster of footprints that anyone could have found them, whether or not they had any knowledge of tracking at all. Beau's prediction had been correct. They'd easily found, about a half a mile or so from the spot where they got water, a cluster of footprints at the water's edge, clearly caused by heavy foot traffic. There was a worn path as well, indicating that it was a regularly travelled route. Daryl and Beau both suspected it would lead them to the other group. If they were lucky, they might not have to employ any tracking skills at all. The path might lead them right to the doorway of the others.

"Do you reckon' they don't know 'bout us, an' that's why they don't care we could find 'em like this?" Beau asked.

"I don't know," Daryl said. "That could be one reason, or either they're big enough and strong enough that they don't _care_." Daryl was more worried about the second possibility. "Come on," Daryl said, turning to start down the path, "let's go see what we're dealing with.

11111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111 

Michonne had silently led the string of Walkers while Sadie had walked beside her, backwards, pushing them off with a board so that they wouldn't get too excited by the prospect of food. Unlike her pets, these Walkers still had the total ability to mutilate anyone that fell within their reach.

Their trainees trailed silently along behind them. They'd decided to only take Jimmy, Junior, Chelsea, and Stella for the time being, leaving Rick to work with any of the others that he wanted to work with.

They'd found a good spot and Sadie had secured the rope so that the team of Walkers couldn't progress any closer to them than they intended. The first thing they did was identify the weapons that each person would be working with, having had to find something for both Stella and Chelsea who had apparently only used firearms for defense prior to this.

Michonne had given Sadie Junior and Jimmy to work with and she'd taken the girls, suspecting they might be less experienced than the two boys and require more interaction. Junior and Jimmy seemed a little more seasoned, perhaps from trying to help defend Dora and Frank. It appeared that the girls had relied heavily on Dominique during their time being separated with him.

Michonne had given them both the same speech she'd given to Beth, but it hadn't worked as effectively as she'd hoped. They weren't really motivated to save anyone else, neither of them feeling like they had anyone that close to them anymore. They were willing to fight for the group, all of whom they were coming to care for, but they didn't have anyone whose lost fanned a fire within them. All that Michonne had to go on after reaching this realization, then, was the hope of fanning a fire within them for self-preservation.

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When they'd finally come to what Daryl suspected was their final location, he'd been surprised and tried to get Beau away from it and hidden in the wooded area nearby so that they could check out the location without being noticed by anyone.

It was a middle school, and it was a pretty good distance from their community, but not too far to be something Daryl was comfortable with.

This group had the protection of a chain link fence that surrounded the parameter of the school. Just like at their own fences, there was a collection of Walkers milling about and pressing themselves against the fences.

Daryl couldn't make out much about the rest of it, though, and he only saw two men from where he was crouched down, walking around.

_Maybe they're doing parameter checks._ He thought. What he could see, however, only gave him a location for the other group, and not much else to go on.

Daryl turned to get Beau's attention, but Beau was gone.

_Somebody outta put a damn bell on that kid._ Daryl thought for a second. Then he heard a hissing above him and looked up. Beau was perched in the tree just to Daryl's right.

"There's two men," Beau whispered down. "They got guns. Looks like military or somethin', they're wearin' uniforms."

"Anybody else you can see?" Daryl whispered back. He had no desire to draw the attention of neither the men nor the Walkers hanging about the fences.

"No," Beau called back, "it looks like they ain't but two people there."

Daryl knew that something wasn't right. There was no way that this group only had two people when Sadie had reported _four_ men being part of the attack that robbed her group of _thirteen_ people. Either this was the wrong group, or the majority of the group was on some sort of lockdown inside the school.

Daryl was fairly confident, though, that this was the right group. The foot traffic that had led them there was not the work of only two men. He lamented momentarily that there was no way for them to get closer, no way to further explore the interior of the camp they'd made, without being seen and probably shot. If they sent Sadie in as they planned, she'd be the one that would have to do the inside exploration when she went to find the others.

Even though Daryl felt that they hadn't found out _all_ that they wanted to know, at least they knew where the other group was now. Daryl turned and looked around him, trying to get his bearings to figure out what would be the quickest way back to the community. He wasn't sure and determined that they would have to take the long way back. He memorized the name of the school quickly, hoping that Michonne would have some idea of where it was located and what would be the most efficient route for their group to take for their future visits.

"Come on, Beau," Daryl whispered, "let's head on back an' tell 'em we found 'em."

Beau dropped down almost silently beside him and they both crouched, crawling through the wooded area until they were far enough out of sight to take the path back to the creek.

Daryl wondered how they were doing at home, anxious to get back and tell them the location, and to further examine their possibilities for moving forward and eliminating this possible threat that hung in the air.

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As practice had gone on, Michonne had time to be surprised at a few things she was contemplating. One was the skill level of Sadie. Watching her collect the Walkers had been interesting, and she'd made two runs since then, bringing back a chain of Walkers with Jimmy and Junior fighting them back. Another thing entirely, though, was her focus when she was working with them loose. You couldn't distract her if you tried. It made Michonne curious as to how Daryl had been able to injure the woman and, assuming that what Mark said could be taken seriously, it was likely only because she had let her guard down under his assurance that all would be fine.

Michonne was also surprised at how much work it had taken for Chelsea and Stella to even become Beth level adept at Walker killing. It truly made her wonder how they'd survived so far. Dominique must have had some skill at Walker killing to have gotten them to the point where they found them, huddled in the supply room at the store, or either they'd all three had some pretty superior luck. She was confident that if the group hadn't found the three of them they wouldn't have survived another week.

They were getting better, though, and more practice would help a lot. It was getting close to time for dinner, though, and Michonne had to admit to herself that she was growing tired of holding the guarded stance behind the two girls. She was ready to rest a little for the evening.

Michonne waved her arms at Sadie, who was busy with Chelsea, trying to get her to kill another of the approaching two that were free. Sometimes it happened, other times Sadie brought her machete crashing into the skull of the Walker. Apparently noticing Michonne trying to get her attention, Sadie didn't give Chelsea the opportunity this time and the Walker dropped instantly. Sadie snatched her machete free and walked over to Michonne.

"Something wrong?" Sadie asked. She was more than visibly tired.

"Time to call it a night," Michonne said. "We'll work some more tomorrow. I need to help Carol with dinner and you look like you could use a breather."

Sadie didn't say anything but she nodded.

"Head on back," Michonne commanded to the group. "Stella, Chelsea, you'll be out here tomorrow with the next group we train. Jimmy, Junior, I think you're best with Rick."

No one responded, but the all sauntered back toward their respective homes. Michonne walked toward the four Walkers that they still had tied up, stepping carefully over those that littered the ground and would have to be gathered together to be burned later. She lopped two of the heads off in one swift movement and noticed that Sadie took her cue, quickly taking down the other two.

"So were you ever scared of Walkers?" Michonne asked Sadie, pausing for a minute to sheathe her katana and regard the woman in front of her.

Sadie shook her head.

"Not for a long time," Sadie said. "I was at first, but then they were after my babies, and I wasn't scared anymore."

Michonne only responded with a nod, heading back toward headquarters with Sadie walking along beside her. It would be time soon for Daryl and Beau to make their way back, and she was anxious for them to get there, wondering what they might have found out, if anything, about the group they'd be going up against.


	72. Chapter 72

"Do you know where that's at, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked.

They had pulled everyone together to tell them about the location they'd found where they suspected the other group might be hiding.

"I know where that is, Daryl. If you'd gone up a piece from here to the main road and followed it, straight across, you would end up close to that school. That little wooded area should come out not too far from the main road out there," Michonne said, gesturing as though they were outside instead of in headquarters. Daryl was entertaining Hope and Michonne was scribbling notes again for Sadie.

"Do you think me an' Sadie could get there by goin' through the woods? That would keep us hid pretty good 'til we got there." Beau said.

Michonne shrugged. "I _think_ you could do that."

"So we go tomorrow?" Sadie asked after a moment.

"Are you sure you wanna go in there alone?" Daryl asked. "I mean we couldn't see nothin', you'd be goin' in there blind."

Sadie read the message, then nodded.

"Someone has to do it. I need to get to our friends, and I will be able to tell you where everybody is. Beau will keep watch. He'll let you know if I don't come back," she responded.

"Well alright then," Daryl said, pausing to bite the skin at his thumb and regard the woman. "You got some set a' balls."

Sadie didn't respond, just laughed at him.

"Make sure ya take whatever ya want, and Beau you better have a good back up plan 'fore ya head out there. You might not have much time for figurin' it out later," Daryl said.

As far as he could see, there was nothing left to be discussed for the time being. Sadie and Beau would go to the community the next day as things continued around here in preparation for the upcoming attack. Daryl figured at this point there was nothing left but for everyone to go to bed and get some rest.

He dismissed the group and watched as everyone headed off in their directions.

Daryl caught Michonne around the waist and pulled her to him in a kiss, Hope laughing between them as her mother closed in on them. Michonne smiled at her and plucked her out of Daryl's arms.

"You reckon Sadie's gonna be able ta pull this off tomorrow?" Daryl asked Michonne as they headed toward their house, relieved for the moment that he didn't have to worry about where the woman was since she wouldn't hear his concern anyway.

"I don't know, Daryl," Michonne said. She was honestly a little concerned simply because there was so much that they didn't know about the location. "I guess she's got about as good a chance as anyone of pulling it off, though. She's not nearly as helpless as the majority of people in this group, even if she does have the disadvantage of not being able to hear."

"Yeah," Daryl said, "Carol told me about y'all's little trainin' plan today."

"Are you mad, Daryl?" Michonne asked.

"Nah, 'Chonne, I ain't mad if you're careful, but I will be mad if'n I hear tell of you goin' out them gates, so don't think you can slip that past me," Daryl responded.

Michonne smiled to herself.

"Deal, Daryl. I'll stay inside the gates," she said.

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Beau walked through the woods silently with Sadie following only a few steps behind. He was fairly confident about the direction they were travelling, but wasn't entirely sure that everything was going to go well. Sadie carried three different weapons, her knife at one thigh, her machete at the other, and she was also carrying a handgun that Rick had loaned her. In her pocket she'd tucked some wire cutters, intending on making her own entrance into the enemy camp.

Beau didn't speak to her, and she didn't speak to him.

When they finally reached the break in the woods, the middle school was across the street from them. They both regarded it for a moment. There were two men wandering around, as they had been before. Beau wasn't sure if they were the same two men or not. There was still no other sign of life except the few Walkers that crowded at the fences like at their camp. Sadie and Beau stayed just behind the tree line of the wooded area, both planning their next moves.

"OK," Sadie said.

Beau put his finger to her mouth. She was speaking too loudly.

She nodded, and mouthed that she was going. Beau whispered "Good luck" to her just before she took off in a trot. Keeping low.

Beau scurried up the closest tree that had a good lookout branch and picked up the binoculars he'd gotten from Rick, trying to keep a watch simultaneously on Sadie and on the two men sauntering around in the yard.

Sadie was keeping low, which was good, but Beau was uncomfortable that she was still going to draw the attention of the guards. Beau watched both of them carefully. There was no cover at all for the woman, she was basically running, looking for a good place to get in, and hoping that they didn't notice her.

Beau saw one of the men start in the direction of the fence where he would clearly see Sadie. Beau wasn't sure what to do. He couldn't signal her in any way. She was on her own out there. Finally he decided that it was time to employ his distraction strategy, hoping that it worked.

Near the fence, away from the direction that Sadie was travelling in, there was some kind of collection of wood and whatnot. Beau had noticed it when he and Daryl had been there. He reached in his quiver and pulled out one of the arrows that he'd prepared for a diversion. He held himself tight to the limb with his thighs and fumbled in his pocket, pulling out the lighter he'd put there. He struck it and lit the fuel soaked rag that was balled up and secured around the end of the arrow. He loaded it quickly, surprised at the heat from the flames, and silently prayed that the arrow made its mark. He aimed and let go.

The arrow _did_ make its mark, and though it didn't immediately catch the attention of the guards, it was only a moment later before a flicker of a flame and some smoke from the woodpile began to trail out, drawing them both to examine how their supply had suddenly combusted.

Beau lifted the binoculars and searched for Sadie, but she wasn't anywhere to be seen. He panicked a little for a moment and then searched the fence. There was a small hole, on the far side, that she'd apparently cut. He could do nothing now but be patient, assume that she was inside, and try to gauge how long she should be in there before he assumed that something had happened.

He turned his attention back to the guards, hoping that Sadie wasn't having any difficulty inside the walls.

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Without Sadie to collect the Walkers for her, and not trusting anyone else to repeat the same steps that Sadie had taken, Michonne had ruled out Walker training for the day. Rick had taken some people to work on target training, and Michonne decided that she would spend the day with Carol, helping her with whatever she needed help with.

She'd gone looking for Carol, but all she had found was Carl, apparently on babysitting duty.

"Where's Beth?" Michonne asked. She put Hope down with Judith and reached down to rub Judith's head.

"Dad said she needed to practice," Carl said. "I didn't need to practice. I'm real good with the bow now, too. Beau said that Daryl will take me out soon, hunting."

Michonne smiled at Carl.

"He might, you know, we can always use more hunters in this group," she said. Carl smiled back at her. "Where's Carol?" She asked after a minute.

"She went down to the fields," Carl said. He was sitting in one of the chairs that Carol kept outside for when she was working out there, just a little bit away from the girls' playpen, and he was scraping at something with a knife.

"What are you doing?" Michonne asked.

"I'm making arrows," Carl said. "Beau showed me how and said he might need a few more today because he won't be able to retrieve the ones he uses to keep Sadie out of trouble. I'm going to surprise him with some when he gets back."

Michonne smiled again.

"You like Beau?" She asked.

Carl nodded. "Beau knows a lot of things, and he tells me all the time that I'm like his little brother. Beau doesn't treat me like I'm a kid, you know? I'm not a kid anymore, and he knows that."

"No, you're not a kid," Michonne said. "Are you OK with the girls while I help Carol?"

"Sure, they're no problem," Carl said.

"Fine," Michonne said, "you know where to find us if you need anything."

She spun around and headed toward the fields, leaving Carl to the entertainment of his whittling and the sounds of the squealing girls.

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Michonne found Carol watering plants and she fell in to help her.

"When you go back over, have a look in the bucket," Carol said.

Michonne finished her watering can and walked back toward the wheelbarrow to fill it. She stopped, peaking in the bucket. In there was an assortment of the things they were nurturing, mostly small, barely enough to feed three of them, but it was still a promise, and she understood why Carol was smiling about it. Somehow the promise of the food was enough to push out of her mind right now that Beau and Sadie were out there, and that there was a chance that at least one of them, if not both, wasn't coming back.

Michonne tipped one of the buckets of water to fill her watering can, ready to join Carol again.

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Beau felt like he'd been sitting up there forever, scanning the school in front of him for some sign of Sadie. His guards had provided him with a little entertainment. They hadn't gone for help in the situation of the small fire that they'd encountered. Instead they'd examined it stupidly for a bit, the fire growing while they failed to react. Then they'd finally decided to scatter the wood and put out the flames.

Beau thought they had found his arrow because they'd spent the rest of the time patrolling, but they were patrolling in that area, looking for some sign of intruders, completely unaware that their intruder had entered on the far side.

Finally Beau spotted Sadie, running toward her hole a little awkwardly. He hoped she hadn't been injured, but he really couldn't tell what was wrong with her at the moment.

He turned his attention back to the guards. Apparently alerted by something, one of them was starting to make their way more in the direction where they would spot Sadie. Beau turned his attention briefly back to her and she was squirming through her hole with some difficulty.

The guard was going to see her, Beau knew that much. He turned his attention back to the guard and when the man made a move for the gun he carried, Beau yanked an arrow out of his quiver.

Beau made a quick prayer, the only kind he knew how to make these days, pleading that just this once he could be the marksman that he prided himself on being. He loaded the arrow, aimed, and released it.

"I'll give up eatin' for a week if I can make this," he'd whispered as he'd let the arrow fly, not sure if the distance and angle was going to keep him from attaining his goal.

The man went down, and Beau whispered a thank you into the air. He looked back, not picking up his binoculars this time and noticed Sadie, hunched and running, one arm tight against her chest and the other wielding her machete and trying to fight off the Walkers that _had_ noticed her, even if the guards had not.

A shot rang out and Beau turned his attention back to the second man. Apparently alarmed by the loss of his partner, the guard was firing into the wooded area. They were wild shots, since he didn't know where the arrow had come from.

_That's right, asshole, keep waistin' ya bullets._ Beau thought.

Apparently the guard noticed Sadie then and fired twice in her direction. She still wasn't clear of the wooded area, the Walkers having slowed her down. Beau loaded his bow again, and aimed at the second guard, knowing it was a long shot because of the distance.

The arrow missed its mark, but it did catch the attention of the guard and he started firing haphazardly into the woods, in the direction from which the arrow had come.

Beau knew the gun would run out of bullets soon, but he would also run out of arrows. Sadie was only feet from the wooded area, though, where she could take cover and not be an exposed target. She was running without looking back, unaware of the shots fired behind her, and hopefully not hit.

Beau lit another of the fuel soaked arrows and let it fly in the direction of the second guard.

_I'll burn the fuckin' place down if I can,_ Beau thought.

When Sadie had finally made it into the wooded area, Beau looked down. She kept running, not stopping for him, and he couldn't blame her. She would want to be well buried in the brush before she stopped. He got up and followed her, through the branches around him, until she finally came to a stop. He dropped beside her and she screamed a little, but he lunged out and put his hand over her mouth in a quick movement.

"Just me," he said, staring at her. "Just me."

She stopped making noise after a minute and Beau assessed her. In one arm she had a bundle, and she immediately began ripping at her shirt.

"What are you doing?" Beau asked. Sadie didn't respond. Beau found her very difficult to get information from. Then she revealed that the bundle she had actually contained a small baby. She ripped open her shirt finally and pushed the baby at her breast. Beau tried to look away, but she seemed completely unmoved by the fact that she was topless in front of him. He looked at her ripped shirt and realized there was a decent amount of blood there. "You hit? You OK? Why you bleedin'?" Beau asked. Sadie looked at him, but didn't say anything. She just continued on at this point in the direction of the community.

Beau followed behind her, his arrow in hand, keeping watch for Walkers. Sadie killed one, and he took down another two, before they were finally in sight of their own safe fences. Beau breathed a sigh of relief when he was able to see the gates and see Maggie and Glenn pulling them open.

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"Get Carol!" Beau called as he was running toward the gates a few steps behind Sadie who was also at a full jog.

Glenn and Maggie swung open the gates, quickly trying to clear the area of Walkers. Carl trotted off to alert Carol and Michonne that Sadie and Beau were returning and apparently needed help.

Once they were inside and the gates were shut, both Sadie and Beau stopped, gasping for air. Sadie went straight to headquarters and Beau tagged behind her, aware that Carol was running toward them with Michonne and Carl just behind her.

"Maggie, help please," Carol called out as she jogged past and toward headquarters.

Once in the kitchen, everyone was trying to figure out what was going on. Michonne watched as Beau grabbed Sadie roughly by the arm.

"Sit," he commanded, shoving her at a chair. Carol had already started over to find out what they were dealing with. Sadie hissed at Beau's action and it caught Michonne's nerves for a moment.

Michonne didn't really know why she did it, but she immediately reached out and grabbed Beau roughly.

"How about _you_ sit down?" She barked, shoving him. Beau tumbled backward, losing his footing and landing with a thud on the floor.

"What the hell'd ya do that for?" He asked.

The noise had drawn Carol's attention and Sadie had swung around to look at him as well, following Carol's lead.

"She's not a dog, Beau. She's an intelligent woman and people around here need to stop grabbing her and shoving her. You could have just _asked_ her to sit," Michonne growled, turning her attention to Sadie.

Beau sat quietly and watched the women. He hadn't meant to infer that Sadie was a dog or anything of the sort, but he hadn't had much luck in talking to her. Michonne was moody sometimes, though, so he could chalk it up to that. Regardless of the situation, he knew better than to respond in any way. Daryl was fiercely protective of Michonne and Beau didn't fancy much the idea of irritating Daryl.

Carol had discovered that Sadie was holding a very small baby, and it was suckling her.

"Sadie, where did you get the baby?" Carol asked, moving Sadie's face to look at her.

"Katie," Sadie responded. She was still trying to get her breath completely.

"Is it Katie's baby?" Carol asked.

Sadie shook her head.

"Mine. Katie didn't make it. They gave it to me," she said.

"I've got to get her shirt off and find out where the blood is coming from," Carol said.

Michonne moved to take the baby and Sadie protested.

"Sadie, I'm not going to take your baby," Michonne said. "Carol just wants to look at you and you can have…" she paused a moment examining the infant, "him back," she finished.

Carol peeled Sadie's shirt off.

"It's cuts or scratches," Carol said. "They look clean, so it looks more like cuts."

"Sadie, where did the scratches come from?" Michonne asked.

"The fence," Sadie explained.

"No Walkers?" Michonne asked.

Sadie shook her head.

"Not a problem," Carol said. "I can clean these. Maggie, I need alcohol and bandages," she commanded. Maggie nodded and went to get them.

"Carol's going to clean up your cuts," Michonne said.

The baby had begun to wail and Michonne was trying to quiet it.

"He's hungry," Sadie said. "I still have milk, but I don't know how much."

"We've got some formula," Michonne said, "and I make a lot of milk. He'll be fine until your supply builds back up. Can I take him to feed him until Carol gets you cleaned up?"

Sadie nodded and Michonne took the baby to the kitchen to get him some food. She judged the infant to only be a few weeks old at best, and she was fairly certain, then, what may have happened to Katie.

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When Sadie's wounds were cleaned and bandaged, Michonne gently returned the now sleeping infant to her arms.

"Was Katie a friend of yours?" She asked. Something in Sadie's eyes looked different.

"She was my brother's…" Sadie paused, "girlfriend in the group. She was pregnant when they took them."

"So the baby is your nephew?" Michonne asked.

Sadie shrugged.

"Don't know," she said. She touched the baby's cheek. "Doesn't matter."

Michonne nodded, understanding what she was saying.

"Do you have a name for him?" She asked.

"Paul," Sadie said. "My brother's name."

"Is he deaf?" Carol asked. Michonne repeated the question to Sadie.

"Don't know," Sadie said after a minute. "My brother wasn't."

"It doesn't matter," Michonne said after a second and Sadie smiled at her.

"And you're still producing milk?" Carol asked. Michonne repeated the question to Sadie and Sadie turned to Carol.

"My youngest was the last that was with me," she explained. "It's easier to keep them safe when they are smaller."

Carol and Michonne both looked at each other, but neither spoke. Sadie was calm about the statement, so they let it be.

"You need some rest," Michonne said. "Let me help you and Paul back to your house. Carol will find Mark to help you and I'll send Maggie after a crib."

Sadie looked exhausted. She raised her hand and gestured a thank you to Michonne and let her help her back to her house and right up to her bed. Michonne helped her get undressed and in bed, the baby sleeping beside her. Michonne had no idea how Sadie would handle a baby if she couldn't hear it cry, but since the woman had raised five children, at least until the end of the world and a little after, she figured that Sadie must have her secrets. She left her resting and went back to join Carol.

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Daryl had resisted disturbing Sadie while she was resting, but he was anxious to know what she had found out about the other group. Beau's reports were only outsider reports. She was the one that would have the most information. He'd nearly gone crazy pacing the parameters of their fences, checking for problems he knew weren't there, waiting for dinner when she'd come and he could announce a meeting.

"There are three left from our group," Sadie explained, holding the baby and reading questions over Michonne's shoulders, not used to having everyone's attention. "Three women," she continued. "They said the others had been traded."

"Traded? What'cha mean?" Daryl asked.

Sadie read his question and shrugged.

"Don't know. That's all they said. There are two others there, a man and a woman, from another group. They aren't happy there. They want to leave. They'll fight with us," Sadie said.

"How many people do they have?" Daryl asked.

"They're down one," Beau said.

Sadie read the question.

"Don't know. They didn't know. If you're part of their group you do watches, if you're not, you spend all your time in the classrooms for your group. The three that are left said that they weren't let out because they tried to get away. That's why the other two people from the other group are with them," Sadie said.

"How did you find them?" Rick asked.

"I went door to door. The others I saw thought I was lost. I pretended to be dumb, and they didn't ask questions," she explained, shrugging a little.

"So it's a high traffic group," Rick offered. "Lots of people in, lots out apparently."

"'Lots' can be relative these days," Maggie offered.

"I told them three days," Sadie continued. "That morning they're going to mark themselves. They're going to tie pieces of…" she paused, "flags around their arms. That's how we know they'll fight for us."

"So we kill everyone else?" Daryl asked.

Sadie shrugged again.

"We don't have a choice," Tyreese offered. "This is a group that doesn't play by our rules. We wouldn't ever keep anyone prisoner here, and we certainly wouldn't _trade_ our people, whatever that means. We have to get rid of this group."

"It seems so horrible," Glenn said, "to just go in and kill everyone when they haven't even bothered us yet."

"That 'yet', my friend, is the key word," Tyreese said. "We have to get them before they get us."

"He's right," Rick said. "They are the kind of people we don't need around here anymore. With the world the way it is, the last thing we need is to let people like that continue living in our own backyard. It's just a matter of time before they come here, so we might as well take care of it before we suffer more casualties than we might suffer facing them in battle."

Daryl nodded. He understood that Glenn didn't like the idea, because he didn't like it either, but he also understood the argument that this was the only course of action they had.

"We got three days," he said. "Everybody better get ready."

Daryl dismissed the group and went home with Michonne. Snuggled against her that night, his hand resting on her belly, he felt the same way he had when he'd known the Governor was coming and it was just a matter of time.


	73. Chapter 73

**AN: The next few chapters, due to the nature of the chapters, are going to be pretty group/other character focused chapters. We've got a lot ahead of us to explore. They're also going to be fairly "heavy" chapters, so hang in there and I'll try to fluff you up as soon as possible.**

**Please review if you feel so inclined. I do value your feedback as well as the support of knowing that you're still with me!**

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The next morning, after breakfast, Sadie and Michonne held the gates open for two of the trucks to pass through. Tyreese, Carol, Maggie, Glenn, and Sasha were going on the much needed hospital run to prepare for the aftermath of the upcoming battle.

Sadie and Michonne had planned to do another round of Walker training with anyone that was interested and Rick and Daryl were working with anyone that wanted more target practice. Everyone was busy with _something_.

Carl had been told he was staying behind and had grudgingly taken babysitting duty, grumbling the entire time about his growing "nursery" and the fact that he could fight as good as, if not better, than a number of the individuals that were going. Rick had put his foot down, though. The battle ahead of them still wasn't very well organized and he didn't want Carl out there. No one was going to tell Rick that he was wrong. Carl was his child, and everyone knew that what they were going to attempt was going to be risky to them all.

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The hospital parking lot had afforded them very few Walkers as they spilled out of the trucks, but everyone knew that what a hospital looked like on the outside had very little to do with what it looked like on the inside.

They were all armed with both guns and handheld weapons, knowing that the guns were only a last resort. In a space like a hospital, firing a gun was somewhat akin to wringing the dinner bell and no one wanted to do that.

"OK," Glenn said, "we'll split up. I'll take Maggie and we'll go in one direction and the three of you go in the other. Try to stay together."

"Remember," Maggie added, "stay as close as you can to stairwells. They offer the best cover for a quick escape if they start to herd on you."

Carol had given everyone a list of things that they needed and everyone carried a large sack over their backs with the command to get as much as possible.

"We'll meet back here at the trucks. Try to be quick about it, get in and out as soon as you can," Glenn said.

Everyone nodded their understanding and started toward the entrance to the hospital.

Inside the lobby there were all of four Walkers, a low number for a hospital and everyone started to feel a little better for a moment, taking those four out. Without speaking, Tyreese signaled that he was taking his group in one direction and Glenn and Maggie nodded, starting off in the other. Silence was going to be key to this operation.

Tyreese hadn't originally planned to go on this run. He didn't feel like he was the greatest on runs. He wasn't the quickest member of the group, so he'd often let the others go, but seeing Carol and Sasha both loading into the vans this morning had driven him to the spur of the moment decision to join them.

Now they were trotting down the hall, looking for some kind of supply closet to duck into and fill their sacks, as quickly as possible. So far, the Walker population seemed low, a few here, a few there, but nothing that they couldn't handle, especially not with the three of them. Tyreese hoped Glenn and Maggie were fairing as well as they were so far.

They hadn't found what they were looking for, and they were venturing farther down the hallway than Carol had hoped they would need to go. She'd hoped they'd find a supply room of sorts not too far from the lobby. Each door that they passed, each one they peered into or opened, held the threat of another Walker, or worse, several. In hallways like these it was easy to get trapped, and all three of them were on guard to avoid that happening. They slipped past a few doors that looked like offices of some type and continued looking.

Sasha turned to Carol, who was right behind her, Tyreese a few feet behind them and she pointed upward. Carol understood that she was suggesting they try the second floor. Maybe Glenn and Maggie had scored a first floor storage facility and they could find more on the second. Carol turned her attention to looking for a staircase. She turned, briefly and signaled toward the ceiling to let Tyreese know they were planning on going upstairs as soon as possible.

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Sadie came to check on the baby, peeling off the extra layer of clothes she was wearing that was drenched in Walker mess. Despite the warm weather, she was going through quite a few long sleeved shirts during the Walker training. It wasn't so much the killing them that was disgusting and made her want to cover herself and change often, as it was the efforts at getting the Walkers hobbled.

As she approached, she noticed Carl sulking, sitting in his chair with his arms crossed and a clearly bitter expression on his face.

He was sitting in the sun instead of under the umbrella that had been brought for him. The girls played in their pen under a tent that Carol had set up for them, and the baby was napping in a seat.

"Has he been good?" Sadie asked, approaching the bitter young man.

Carl shrugged, "Fine," he said.

"What's wrong?" Sadie asked, walking over to Carl and sitting on the ground next to him so that she could see his lips. "You look angry."

Carl looked like he wasn't going to answer her at first, but seeing that she had no intention of leaving him alone, he finally decided to respond.

"I wanted to go fight," Carl said. "If we're going to take out this group that could threaten me, could threaten all of us, I want to fight. I'm sick of being treated like a kid! I'm not a kid anymore and I've more than proven that! Everyone else is going out there, but I'm supposed to stay here and help with the babies. It's not fair. I could help out there."

Sadie regarded him. She'd gotten most of what he said, enough to know why he was upset. She was good at reading people, but she didn't need to be good at it to see that Carl was frustrated, and this frustration wasn't anything new. She'd seen the conflict earlier, briefly, but hadn't known entirely what was going on between Carl and Rick.

One thing she'd already learned was that Rick was good at giving orders, but he wasn't always clear as to why you should _follow_ those orders. If he said it, it was a type of decree. Something to be obeyed but not questioned. Sadie had seen that in a few interactions with Rick. She imagined he was no less demanding with his son.

"You are not a child," she said after a few minutes, "you are a man, right?"

Carl looked at her.

"I don't know," he said, "but I'm not a kid."

Sadie nodded.

"Sometimes, when we grow up, we have to do things that we don't want to do, especially now. Sometimes we have to fight when we don't want to fight, and sometimes we have to stay back when we don't want to stay back," Sadie said, struggling to think ahead in her argument even as she spoke.

"It doesn't make sense for me to stay back," Carl said. "I get why Mark is staying back, why Carol is staying back, why Michonne is staying back. I don't think that _I _need to be staying back, though. The only reason dad doesn't want me going out there is because he thinks I'm still a kid. He thinks I can't _do_ it."

Sadie shook her head at Carl.

"That's not the reason," Sadie said. "Are you good at making decisions?"

Carl nodded. "I think so," he said.

Sadie nodded.

"Do you think that you could be a leader? A good leader?" She asked.

Carl nodded.

"Your dad wants you here, to be a leader," Sadie said.

Carl looked frustrated. "Leaders don't stay behind, Sadie, that's why you call them leaders," he protested.

Sadie smiled.

"No, they don't, but future leaders do. They have to be behind the leaders, so that when the leaders step down, they can step up. Your dad is leaving you here as a future leader. If something happens, and none of us come back, you would have to be the leader. You would keep things going here. That's a very big job, bigger than going with us," Sadie said.

Carl considered it a moment.

"But you're all coming back," Carl said. He couldn't imagine, and didn't want to imagine, that they could all walk out those gates to go to battle and no one return.

"We hope we're coming back, but we might not," Sadie said. "Your father wants to be prepared in case the worst happens. Could you be that leader if we don't come back?"

Carl thought about it and Sadie watched his face change as he tried to wrap his mind around the concept.

"I wouldn't want to," Carl said, "but I could."

Sadie smiled at him.

"That's why you're staying here. You're the right man for the job if something happens," she said. Sadie got up and collected the baby out of his seat, taking a moment to gently touch each of the girls that had developed a sudden interest in her. She took the baby toward headquarters to feed him, hoping that Carl wouldn't look so bitter through the upcoming days.

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Just as they had found the stairwell, Carol and Sasha became immediately aware that they had company. Spilling out from some of the rooms were more than a few Walkers, more than the few that they'd seen so far, at least. They were between the two women and Tyreese.

"I can handle them," Tyreese called, "you two go ahead."

He'd drawn the attention then of the Walkers. Carol wanted to help him, but she felt Sasha grab her by the arm and yank her into the stairwell, closing it quickly.

"There weren't that many," Sasha whispered. "He can take care of them, if we can get some supplies we can be back down in a hurry. We need to get out of here as soon as possible."

Carol was worried about Tyreese. She was sure that he could handle the number of Walkers that had spilled out, and getting herself or Sasha crowded up in the middle of them wasn't going to make it any easier on him, but she hated just leaving him down there and not knowing what was happening.

She followed Sasha up the pitch black staircase, feeling out the stairs with her feet as she went, Sasha's cool hand clutching her on the arm. When they came out on the second floor, Sasha opened the door, a little light flooding in, and peered out in the hall.

"Coast looks clear," she whispered. They left the shelter of the stairwell and started on their trek in search of supplies. For a moment, Carol wished she had paid more attention to the little things in life, like where supply rooms were located in hospitals, but that was information that she never thought she'd have to know.

Finally the two women stumbled upon a supply room, only a few Walkers coming having sauntered into their way. They opened the door, elated to finally locate something worthwhile. A solitary Walker lurked in the room and Sasha immediately took it out. She closed the door behind them, leaving them in the dark, but more protected from outside Walkers that might smell them.

They went to work packing their bags with any and everything they could get their hands on. It was too dark in the room to tell what most of what they were grabbing was, and neither had thought ahead to bring a flashlight. It didn't matter, though, what mattered was cramming the bags as full of anything and everything as was possible and getting back to the others quickly.

When their bags were stuffed, they zipped them up and both women shouldered the heavy packs. Sasha opened the door and peered out, cursing to herself about the dimness of the hallway.

"Looks clear," she whispered, opening the door wider and pushing Carol out in front of her. Carol reached her hand back and took Sasha's, hoping she remembered correctly the way back to the stairwell. They'd wandered farther from it than they'd hoped to wander, but at least they had two bulging bags worth of supplies that could very well come in handy in the following days.

Carol felt like it was growing darker in the hallway, and she hoped that time hadn't slipped away from them and that it wasn't growing too dark outside. She couldn't imagine it was, but time had a way of slipping up on you when you were focused on things.

Carol heard growling. She swallowed hard, trying to make out any movement or shapes in front of her. She couldn't see anything. She turned to look behind them and could see that Sasha, having dropped her hand, was already on guard against a handful of approaching Walkers. Carol palmed her knife and ran at them.

The growling got louder, and turning the corner that was now behind her, Carol saw more Walkers coming. There were a few spilling out of surrounding rooms. They were so close to the staircase, so close to refuge, but the number of Walkers spilling into the tight, dimly lit hallway was threatening to cut them off from escape entirely.

Carol _felt_ the Walkers around her, as she worked to stab at them. She cringed when she felt their fingers grasping at her. Sasha was fighting as hard as she could against those coming from the other direction, and Carol hoped they'd be able to clear the hallway enough to dart into the stairwell. She hoped Tyreese would be waiting downstairs.

Carol heard Sasha cry out and she stabbed the Walker that was directly approaching her before turning and stabbing one that was attacking the girl.

"No! No!" Carol cried out. She tried to stab a few more, but their cries were drawing others.

Sasha was crying, and understandably so. She threw her bag toward Carol, falling backwards.

Carol reached and grabbed her by the arm, trying to pull her back up.

"I'm bit, Carol," Sasha pleaded. "Take the stuff, go!"

Carol pulled at her, realizing that she was sobbing too.

"No," Carol said. "We'll take you back, we'll figure something out," she pleaded.

"Carol, there's nothing to do. Take the bag, go!" Sasha pleaded.

Carol killed another Walker that was nearing Sasha, seeing several slowly making their way down the hallway toward them.

"Go now!" Sasha commanded. "Before they get here! Go! I've got my gun, I'll be fine, but I won't do it until you go," she pleaded, looking at the slowly approaching Walkers. "Please go, leave me enough time," Sasha sobbed.

Carol grabbed the bag, sucked in her breath and killed a Walker that was between her and the stairwell. Once inside, she slumped against the door, sucking in air and trying to process what had just happened. She heard the gunshot, and she knew she had to go, even though she wanted to stay there a little longer, resting against the door. Everyone else would have heard the shot too, though, it may even have stirred up Walkers elsewhere in the hospital, and she needed to try to get out with the sacks. She had no idea, though, how she was going to tell them, how she was going to tell Tyreese, what had happened to Sasha.

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Glenn and Maggie were the first to be ready to leave, their bags bulging. The run hadn't been difficult for them, and they were surprised. Their first attempt to raid a hospital had been a harrowing event where they only barely escaped, and had left behind everything they'd picked up in order to move faster.

They'd maybe encountered 30 Walkers total since they'd entered the hospital, the four in the lobby excluded, and their bags were brimming. They'd found a supply closet as well as two really well stocked offices and they'd left next to nothing behind. Both of them were weighted down and heading back down the hallways they'd travelled earlier, stepping over the Walkers that they'd put down. The hallways weren't filling with Walkers around them, so they thought they might even have the luck of making the return trip to the entrance without any encounters.

Then they heard the muffled sound of gunfire, though they couldn't pinpoint where it had come from.

"That had to be the others," Maggie whispered.

Glenn didn't say anything. He didn't know what to say. A gunshot meant someone was in trouble, someone was in big trouble. You wouldn't dare to fire a shot unless you were desperate for the fact that it could draw every Walker on that floor to you. Whoever it had been, though, had only fired once, and to Glenn that wasn't a promising number of shots. If you were going to shoot Walkers, you had to be committed to it. In these conditions you'd have to keep firing until you reached some kind of safety. One shot, he thought with a shiver, might not have been meant for Walkers.

Maggie wanted to go and help them, to find out what had happened and who had fired the shot. Why they had fired the shot. As they neared the lobby, however, she felt Glenn grab her wrist and tug her toward the doors. There were a few Walkers ambling about in the lobby again and Glenn forged ahead, slamming the hatchet he was carrying into their heads as they approached.

"We gotta go help them!" Maggie said a little louder than she wanted to.

"We can't help them, Maggie. Wherever they fired that shot is bound to be overrun with Walkers. Look around you, the halls are starting to fill up now. We have to get out of here," Glenn said, fighting back the cracking in his own voice.

"We can't just _leave_ them," Maggie hissed.

"We're not going to leave them. We'll go back to the vans and we'll wait, just like we agreed," Glenn said. "We'll wait for them to come."

"What if they don't come?" Maggie asked.

Glenn didn't respond, he just continued to drag her with him, almost to the doors that would grant them access to the outside.

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Carol burst through the door into the first floor. It seemed brightly lit in comparison to the black stairwell. She'd had to drag her feet, carefully, feeling for every step, not wanting to fall and break something, further weighed down by the two heavy packs she carried.

She was exhausted, overwhelmed with emotion, and worried that she didn't have the strength to fight the half dozen Walkers waiting for her in the hallway. She stabbed them, though, one by one as they approached her, panting. She came to the point where a mass of them blocked the floor and her stomach wrenched a little. She carefully stepped over the piled, letting her eyes search it for a moment.

Tyreese wasn't there. He had escaped them at least. He hadn't come for her and Sasha, and she hoped that he had gotten out already.

She continued on, knowing the lobby wasn't far ahead, and then the outside, and the vans. She'd wait there and try to figure out how to tell them Sasha wasn't coming, that the shot they'd heard had been her final moment. She felt overcome for a second and gasped in air, determined now to make it out.

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Glenn and Maggie didn't know how long they'd been waiting in the parking lot, standing by the trucks since the Walker threat was minimal at the moment. They hadn't seen more than they could take care of without barely getting winded.

When Tyreese finally appeared from the side of the building, walking almost leisurely toward them, they were both relieved for a moment. He looked unharmed, even flashing them a smile before driving his hammer into the skull of an approaching Walker and continuing on as though nothing had happened.

"He's alone," Maggie said.

"Maybe Carol and Sasha are just behind him," Glenn said, trying to sound optimistic. "Maybe they got split up."

As Tyreese approached he called out to them.

"Got separated, blocked in for a bit, took an emergency exit. Wasn't anybody there to stop me, and it was an emergency to me," he said. He was smiling. "Glad y'all waited on me."

Tyreese approached and went around to load his bag in the truck, still talking, apparently not noticing the worried faces of Glenn and Maggie.

"Don't know how useful what I got was, but I didn't see too much that we could use. I picked up a bag full of whatever I could find, though, raided a few rooms. Maybe there's something there. Everything helps, right?" He said. He walked around to the front of the van where Maggie and Glenn stood.

"Did y'all get into a tight spot?" He asked. "I heard the shot."

"Wasn't us," Glenn said, swallowing.

Tyreese shaded his hand and studied both trucks. He'd assumed that Carol and Sasha were in one of them, waiting.

"Where are Carol and Sasha?" Tyreese asked, his face dropping a little.

"Don't know," Maggie said softly.

Tyreese turned for a moment, like he was going to start back toward the hospital.

"You don't know where they are," Glenn said, "and the Walkers got stirred up by the shot, there's no need to go back in there."

Glenn knew that Tyreese desperately wanted to go back in there, and he fully understood. It was Carol and Sasha. Even Glenn wanted to go back in there and he didn't have the relationship with either of them that Tyreese did.

"I gotta go back in there," Tyreese said. He started walking in a determined fashion across the parking lot and toward the hospital.

"We gotta stop him," Maggie said.

"We can't stop him," Glenn said. "If it were you in there, I'd go back. If we tried to stop him now he's liable to lose it with us and try to fight _us_."

"Should we help him?" Maggie asked. She really didn't know what to do in this situation. Part of her knew that it was likely a suicide mission to go back in now, but as she watched Tyreese making his way toward the entrance she felt like they shouldn't just hang back and let him go alone.

Before Tyreese got to the entrance, Carol pushed the door open and nearly spilled out into the parking lot, dropping one of the bags in the process. Tyreese jogged over to her, grabbing her up and pulling her to him, one arm around her waist and the other on the back of her head, burying her face in his chest for a second.

"Oh my God," he said, "I was starting to think something had happened in there," he said. He paused after a second and released her. "Where's Sasha?" He asked.

Carol could see the look of terror already rising in Tyreese's face. She felt herself being overcome with emotion again and she wasn't sure what to say, or what to do. She could immediately tell that her own face told him all that he needed to know. He looked like he was fighting back tears already.

"I'm sorry," Carol said. "I'm so sorry." She broke down then, wrapping her arms around him, wanting to comfort him. For a moment she wished that the tables had been turned and that it had been her that had been overrun in the hallway, though she almost had been.

They both stood there for a moment, clutching at each other, both sobbing quietly.

Maggie and Glenn could tell what had happened, though they didn't know the details. Just watching Tyreese and Carol across the parking lot, Sasha not in sight, made it very obvious what had happened. Maggie started to cry quietly and Glenn reached his arm over, pulling her to him.

Finally, getting himself together, Tyreese reached down and shouldered the bag that Carol had dropped. He wrapped his arm around her waist and silently led her toward the truck that they would be taking, neither of them addressing Maggie or Glenn in any way.

Maggie and Glenn took the cue and got in their truck. Glenn cranked the engine and waited until he could see that Carol and Tyreese were both in their truck before heading back to the community.

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Michonne and Beth had prepared dinner together, realizing that Carol would be getting back too late to make it. Sadie had relieved Carl of babysitting and was trying to entertain the girls while keeping an eye on their newest addition who still spent most of his time sleeping.

Michonne and Beth had also decided to serve dinner, quietly, when the group got back and they realized that Carol wasn't emotionally ready to assist them.

Over dinner she had recounted, to some degree what had happened in the hospital, having to pause a few times to collect herself. Tyreese sat beside her, silent, occasionally putting his hand on her shoulder. He looked emotionally exhausted, but hadn't said anything to anyone. He was trying to keep his composure. That much was evident to Michonne.

The group had agreed to have a moment of silence for Sasha, but the moment had spread out into the vast majority of the meal. No one wanted to speak. The loss of Sasha hung heavy on several of the members, and for those who didn't feel it quite as sharply, it still served as a reminder that no one was promised anything, and the reminder wasn't uplifting in consideration of what they had in store for them.

No one had much interest in talking, everyone was brooding, thinking about something, whether it was someone they lost, someone they had left to lose, or even their own mortality.

As they had left headquarters, Mark and Michonne agreeing to stay behind and take night watch so that Josh and Brenda could start preparing themselves physically to be ready for the upcoming battle which would require them not to be nocturnal, each person had passed by Tyreese and offered him some sort of condolence, either in the manner of speaking of a sibling that they too had lost, and offering him the comfort they could, or just in acknowledging his feelings and telling him that they were there, should he wish to seek them out and talk about it.

Sadie was going to be spending the next few nights at Michonne's house, agreeing to look out for all the babies and confessing that she needed Daryl's help to wake her when and if any of them started crying. She was one of the last to leave, hugging Carol first and then Tyreese.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I know it's hard. If you want to talk about it, I'm a good listener."

Tyreese offered her a half smile and squeezed her shoulder.

"Daryl and I will take the babies," she said to Carol. "You don't need to worry about Judith."

Carol thanked her and started as though she were going to gather up dishes.

"I've got it," Michonne said. "Go get some rest. You both look ready to collapse. Mark can watch while I wash, we've got enough time."

Carol thanked Michonne and hugged her for a moment. Michonne returned the embrace and held it until Carol pulled away. She'd already offered her condolences to Tyreese, but she turned to him again as Carol started toward the door.

"I'm really sorry about Sasha," Michonne said, feeling tears welling up in her eyes. "She was a good person, and we're all going to miss her."

Tyreese nodded, not saying anything and squeezed Michonne's shoulder. He passed by her and started toward the door behind Carol. Michonne could hear Daryl speaking to him in the other room as she gathered up the dishes to take to wash them.

When she passed into the other room carrying the stack of dishes, Daryl was leaning against the arm of the sofa. He took the stack from her and followed her out to the tub where she was going to wash them.

"I hate you gon' be doin' night watch," Daryl said. "I wish I could stay with you."

"You need to rest," Michonne said. "I'll be fine with Mark. You've got to help Sadie with the babies. Remember, you've got to wake up any time you hear one of them, I won't be there to get up, Tyreese and Carol are not in any condition to handle it, and Sadie can't hear them."

"I know," Daryl said. "I told her we'd make her some kinda bed or somethin' but she's insistin' she's gon' be fine sleepin' on the floor on a pallet. Said she wanted to stay in our room so I wouldn't have ta go all the way downstairs to wake her."

"That'll work for tonight, Daryl. I'll talk to her tomorrow. Go get some sleep," Michonne said.

Daryl pulled her to him for a minute.

"I'm gon' miss you, 'Chonne, I don't like tryin' ta sleep without'cha," he said.

Michonne could tell that Daryl was affected by the loss of Sasha, probably reminded of losing his own brother. She squeezed him.

"I'm going to miss you too, Daryl, but I'll see you in the morning. You just go to sleep and dream about me and it'll be the same thing," she said.

Daryl reached his hand under her chin, tilting her face toward him. He kissed her and held it for a minute.

"Won't be the same, 'Chonne, but I'll try ta sleep," he said.

"I love you," Michonne responded.

"I love you too, 'Chonne, I reckon I'll see you in the mornin'," Daryl said.

"Goodnight, Daryl," Michonne said, watching him make his way toward their house.

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**AN: That was a hard chapter to write, and I know that there will always be hard chapters. This is, after all, The Walking Dead. I hope no one is too terribly distraught. I need some chocolate now…**


	74. Chapter 74

Michonne had one foot caught in the chair she was sitting in, her arms folded across her knee, and her head resting on her arms. It was going to be a long night sitting in the plastic watch chairs across from Mark who was also obviously a little drowsy.

"You could take a nap if you like," Mark said. "I can keep watch for a while. It doesn't look like much is going on."

"I'm fine," Michonne mumbled. "That's the first rule of watch, no one sleeps on watch."

"But are you going to be able to handle being up all night after having been up all day? I mean don't you _need_ to sleep?" Mark asked.

"I'll be fine," Michonne responded. "I'll sleep tomorrow."

They sat there in silence for a little while. Michonne didn't want to sleep right now. She wasn't sure what her mind would do to her if she tried to sleep right now. She was worried about what was going on in her house. How were Carol and Tyreese handling this? How was Daryl fairing with Sadie and three babies? Would Sadie bring Hope out to her if something went wrong? On top of all of these things, her mind kept drifting back to Sasha, to what had happened, to what _could_ happen in a few days when the group went out to face this other group.

"I didn't really know her," Mark said. "Sasha seemed like a nice girl, though."

"She was," Michonne said, barely lifting her head from her arms. Michonne had cared for Sasha. Sasha was a good person, and she was a dependable member of the community. She was even a preferred companion to Michonne for water runs and the like. Losing her hurt, in fact it hurt more than Michonne really wanted to admit right now. "How long have you known Sadie?" Michonne asked after a minute, hoping to change the subject.

"I don't know," Mark admitted. "Long enough, I guess. She showed up one day with her brother, Paul."

"You care about her a lot, don't you?" Michonne asked, realizing her voice sounded a little odd from having thought about Sasha.

"I do," Mark said. "But then again it's not hard to care about Sadie. Her brother was the same way. He doted on her, called her his baby sister, even though I doubt he was two years older than she was."

"Tyreese was Sasha's big brother," Michonne said. She didn't know how he was going to take the loss. He'd seemed OK at dinner, at least as fine as could be expected, but she also knew that for some people reality took its sweet time sinking in.

"I'm sure it's not easy. I had a brother, but I don't even know what happened to him. He lived in California with the rest of my family. I guess I can sort of convince myself that maybe they weren't affected like we were on this coast. Maybe it's all normal there, you know?" Mark said.

"Yeah," Michonne said. She didn't believe there was anywhere that wasn't affected, but if it made people feel better to think that, then who was she to tell them otherwise?

"I don't really know what's worse, though, _knowing_ what happened to your family, to your friends, or _not_ knowing," Mark said after a minute.

Michonne wasn't sure in the darkness, but she thought she heard his voice crack a little. She couldn't respond to what he had said. She didn't have an answer for it. Both were hard, there was no _easy_ way these days. Loss was loss, whether you were there or not. You were still acutely aware that something, that someone, that was part of your life was now just _gone_. It had always been that way, really, but now it was different somehow. Before there were situations where you lost people and it was sudden, but these days it was _always_ sudden. There was no such thing as being even a little prepared for it.

"Six of one, half a dozen of the other, I guess," Michonne said finally.

Mark just grunted in the darkness.

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Michonne thought she must have dozed off a little. When she became aware of her situation, the dawn was just beginning to break and she felt like she'd been hit by a semi-truck. She groaned a little and raised her head from its position.

"You alright?" Mark asked.

Michonne snapped out of her daze and turned her gaze toward him, her neck catching. She reached her hand up to knead her neck a little.

"I tried to get you to go lie down somewhere, but you wouldn't do it," Mark said.

Michonne vaguely remembered having some conversation with Mark and him tugging at her, but she couldn't remember it all that clearly. Mark got out of his chair and walked around behind her, kneading her neck and shoulders suddenly.

Michonne jerked away from him, not prepared at all for the touch.

"Sorry," Mark said, backing away. "Didn't mean anything, just trying to help," he said, walking back toward his chair.

Michonne didn't say anything for a minute. She was starting to wonder what time it was and if Carol was going to be up to fix breakfast. She wasn't sure if Carol was in that frame of mind, and she felt like she should go and check on her. First, though, she had to go to the bathroom.

"I have to go to the bathroom," Michonne said, finding her voice.

Mark got up and offered her a hand. She hesitated a minute and he laughed.

"I don't know if you know this or not, but I'm gay," Mark said. "I'm about as gay as they come. In fact, I sleep in the same bed with Sadie, and neither of us are fans of clothes, and _nothing_ has even started to happen. I'm _that_ gay. Now I can see you're stiff and I can help you get up, but if you don't want me to, you're welcome to wrestle your numb behind out of that chair on your own."

Michonne smiled. For a brief moment she'd seen a side of Mark that she hadn't seen yet. A side that she hoped to see again, in the future, when all of this was behind them and the community was back to what it had been, back before they were aware of all the danger lurking just on the other side of the wooded area across the street from them.

She reached a hand out to him and he smiled, pulling her up. He was right, much of her lower body felt numb.

"After I go to the bathroom I'll check on breakfast," she said. "Then we both can get some sleep."

"Sounds like a fabulous idea," Mark said, returning to his own chair.

Michonne walked off toward the area where they'd dug their bathrooms.

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Daryl was pretty sure it had been the worst night that he'd had in a while. He officially hated being in bed without Michonne next to him. His bed felt empty, and that was a feeling he didn't like at all. He'd been thinking about Tyreese, and how he must feel losing his sister. He was sure it hadn't been an easy night across the hall.

Sadie slept like a rock, and just as Daryl had been drifting off that baby of hers had started crying. She was keeping it with her, in a bassinet that Maggie had found for her, so that she didn't have far to go to retrieve the child, but he felt like it cried every time he got close to sleep. He was sure that Hope had cried like that in the beginning too, but he'd forgotten much of that. It seemed ages ago.

Every time the child had cried, Daryl had to crawl down to the foot of the bed and continuously poke at Sadie with his foot until she stirred. As soon as she was awake she'd scramble around, feeling for the child in the dark. Halfway through the night he'd given her a flashlight, deciding that it might be stressful for her to be in a strange room in the pitch black. He'd reasoned that if she couldn't hear _and_ she couldn't see, she might be a little disoriented. She'd thanked him for that. A few times she didn't wake easily and he'd worried that he might need to check her for a pulse, prepare to put her down if she turned. But she'd always woken up just as he'd started to become really concerned.

Daryl crawled out of bed now, stretching. He'd have to help get the girls ready. He got out of bed and stopped beside Sadie who was stretched on the pallet at the foot of his bed, the baby sleeping near her. He nudged her in the ribcage with his foot, lifting her a little each time. Finally she'd stirred, stretched, and rolled over. She looked disoriented at first, and then he could tell that reality was slowly sinking in for her.

"Gotta get up," he said. "Gotta get the babies ready an' go ta breakfast."

She stared at him. Then she stretched and started to get up, so he assumed that she had understood him and he started toward the nursery to get the girls up and start getting them dressed.

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Michonne had gone to the bathroom in the semi privacy of one of the "stalls" that they'd built. As she stumbled out, still fully waking, she'd been surprised to find Carol sitting in the grass, not too far from the series of stalls. Michonne got concerned and walked toward her.

"Carol, are you OK?" Michonne asked. She walked over to Carol and kneeled down next to her. She could immediately tell, however, that Carol was _not_ OK. She was sobbing.

Michonne hugged Carol to her, holding her a moment and trying to figure out what to do, what to say.

"Do you want to go somewhere else?" Michonne asked. "Do you want to talk about it, or do you normally cry by the bathrooms at dawn?"

"I was just thinking," Carol said, sobbing.

"About?" Michonne pressed.

"Nothing, it's stupid," Carol said.

Michonne scoffed a little. "Nothing that makes you cry in the grass downwind of the bathrooms is stupid," Michonne offered.

"I've got to potty train Judith soon," Carol said, "and I don't know how. It's not like it was with Sophia, nothing is like it was, I don't know how!"

Michonne hugged Carol to her. The concern she was voicing was, to some degree, a legitimate concern, but Michonne wasn't fooled at all into believing that it was what was really going on here. Carol was having a breakdown of sorts, and it may very well have been the thought of potty training Judith that triggered it, but that wasn't what it was _about_. Michonne understood those things. They all had their breakdowns, and they were all allowed to have them. She wasn't going to deny Carol hers, at least not completely. She'd let her cry it out for a bit, speak the nonsense she needed to in order to get it under control again, and then she'd slap her back into reality if she had to.

"Listen, you're not alone in this, OK? I'll have to do the same thing with Hope, and Sadie's got Paul now, we'll figure it out, it's not the end of the world," Michonne said, thinking of the irony of the phrase even as she said it.

"I'm so tired of it," Carol said, sobbing into Michonne's chest.

"Tired of what, Carol?" Michonne asked. She could imagine a million things that Carol might be tired of without straining herself to think much at all, but she was going to give Carol the opportunity to work through her own demons.

"Tired of the death," Carol said, "tired of people dying for _me, _tired of people dying _for_ me."

Michonne shushed Carol then, rubbing her back.

"No one has died for you Carol, and no one has died because of you," she said.

"T-Dog, Hershel…," Carol started, "and now Sasha. They've all died, Michonne, because of me."

"No, Carol, they didn't. You've told me about T-Dog, even Hershel told me about T-Dog. He was bit when he went with you. He didn't die because of you. He was going to die anyway," Michonne offered. "We all know that when we've been bit we're going to die. Anyone would save someone they cared about if they could, especially if they knew they were going to die anyway. If anything, you gave him a _hero's_ death. The same for Hershel. He didn't die for you anymore than he died for any of us, any more than he died for _himself_, but he died a _hero_. Sasha was bit…" Michonne stopped for a second, a sob welling up in her own chest. She willed it down knowing that now was not the time for it break to the surface. "She was going to die, and if she kept any Walkers from getting to you, then you gave her that, you let her die a _hero_, and that's the greatest death we can hope for anymore. It's a death with _some_ purpose. It's a gift," Michonne said.

"It should have been me," Carol said. "Sasha had so much more to offer, I don't have anything, Michonne…you've said it yourself, I don't do anything important for the group, Sasha was a fighter, and she could have _helped_ everyone."

Michonne had never seen Carol in the condition that she was in right now, puddling into her, sinking down against her. It almost scared Michonne for a moment. She was glad, for a fleeting instant, that neither of them was armed, afraid of what Carol might do right now.

"Don't say that, Carol. I never said that and it's not true, even if I did say it," Michonne argued. "You can't do this, you don't get this indulgence. Rick can fall apart and to hell with him when he does, but _you_ can't do this. You've got one thing, Carol, that _no one_ else has here, and do you know what that is?"

Carol just sobbed for a minute before responding in the negative.

"Carol, you're the rock of this group. OK? You're the one that everyone counts on to be that rock. You can't fall apart on us, and you can't fall apart on Tyreese. He needs you right now, and you can't take that away from him. Everyone who comes into this group realizes it almost automatically, you're the one that we can depend on, the one that holds it all together, and whether or not you think that's important right now, in the crazy, fucked up world that we've found ourselves in, that's _everything_," Michonne argued.

Carol didn't respond for a bit, she just sobbed against Michonne. Michonne indulged her, deciding that she wouldn't protest, though she was terribly uncomfortable, until Carol was calm. She'd never seen the woman like this before, and Michonne wasn't one to leave a friend when that friend needed her.

"I didn't ask to be everyone's rock," Carol said, finally, still crying but calmer than before. Michonne rubbed her hand over Carol's arm and back, trying to soothe her farther, realizing that she was making some progress.

"No one asks for their positions these days," Michonne said. "We don't control how others perceive us, whether positively or negatively, we just accept the role we're given. You're no different than the rest of us. You wear it well, Carol, and your role is a noble role, and it's a respectable role. It's a role that probably has even more stress behind it than those of us who are just supposed to be the protectors. If we fail, it's a job hazard, if you fail, people don't know how to recover. It's easier to think that someone known for their physical strength just wore out, but it's a whole different idea to think that someone known for their _emotional_ strength just wore out."

Carol looked at Michonne for a moment with pleading eyes, still not raising herself from her position of leaning on her.

"I'm not that strong, Michonne…Ed…" she started.

Michonne interrupted her, knowing the stories all too well. "Maybe the time with Ed taught you that strength, or maybe it was that strength that got you through the time with Ed, I don't know, but what counts now is that it's there. I _need_ that strength from you, Daryl _needs _that strength from you, Tyreese _needs_ that strength from you, and goodness knows that Judith needs it. Everyone needs it from you. I remember that one time, when I thought things were about as bad as they could get, you told me that it didn't matter anymore if the glass was half full or if it was half empty, if you were _thirsty_, you _drank_ it and everything would work itself out. I need you to dig down deep right now and remember that," Michonne pleaded. "It's your damn lumpy oatmeal, your line dried clothes, and the fact that you just handle shit that gets most of us through things like Sasha's death. Don't back out on us now," Michonne said.

Carol was quiet for a minute, resting against Michonne, still enough to be lifeless. Finally she stirred and sat up, looking at Michonne. Michonne took her thumbs and gently wiped the tears from under Carol's eyes.

"I'm sorry," Carol said after a minute. Her voice was calmer now, more like it normally was and Michonne was glad to see that she was slowly transforming into her old self. "I'm sorry," she repeated, wrapping her hand around Michonne's wrist.

"It's OK," Michonne said quietly. "We all have our moments."

"I guess I need to get breakfast started," Carol said after a minute.

Michonne smiled. "I'll help you," she said.

"You need to rest," Carol protested, starting to struggle away.

"I will, I promise I'll rest, just after breakfast," Michonne said, starting to climb to her feet.

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Daryl and Sadie were the first two to breakfast, both looking worse for the wear after their night together, but all three children were dressed to some degree. They hovered over Michonne and Carol as they fixed breakfast and Michonne finally took Hope to feed her. She waved her hand, drawing Sadie's attention.

"I can feed Paul, if he's still hungry," she offered.

"He might need more," Sadie said, "but right now he's fine, take your time."

Mark, seeing the crowd beginning to gather outside of headquarters and not far from the gates, had decided to go inside and catch himself a few minutes of sleep before breakfast.

Michonne had to admit that her eyes were burning and she was ready to eat and go and lie down herself.

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After breakfast everyone went their separate ways.

Sadie had declared that she had an idea about a plan of attack for the group to take, and everyone was anxious to hear it. No one liked the idea of entering the other camp without any kind of solid plan at all, so they'd left her to do what she was going to do. Carol had gone to check on Tyreese, and the others were tooling about dealing with things they felt needed to be dealt with.

No one who had known Sasha well seemed to know what to do with themselves. One part of their instinct told them to mourn, while the other told them to prepare for their own possible death in the upcoming days.

Michonne noticed the obvious change in everyone and suspected those like Maggie, Jimmy, and Tyreese who had been closest to Sasha were trying to trick themselves into postponing their mourning. As though they could wait until after the battle to let all their emotions catch up with them. It was a new way of life, though, so she wondered if they were capable of tricking their minds into that, or if they'd find themselves as overwhelmed at some point as Carol had earlier that morning.

One way or the other, Michonne was exhausted. She just wanted to lie down for a minute, or an hour, or five hours. Honestly she didn't care, as long as she was lying down. She was thankful when Daryl offered to walk her to the house. She'd left Hope, kissing her briefly, with Sadie and gone with him.

Daryl basically undressed her. With each garment he removed she felt some relief and some release. She sunk back into the bed, not remembering it to have ever been so comfortable. He sunk in next to her, his arm around her, telling her that he'd stay with her until she drifted off, though she couldn't imagine it to be too far in the future.

Daryl stayed there, lying on the bed fully dressed, until he heard Michonne's methodic breathing. She was asleep, deeply asleep, and he knew it. He lingered a moment longer, savoring the feeling of her body pressed against his. He'd been without it through the night, and he stayed for a bit, hoping to soak up enough of it to last him through the night that was coming. He honestly didn't care about anything except feeling the rhythmic rise and fall of her ribcage as she breathed and etching his hand ever so gently over the rising in her belly that he knew was his child. He wanted to stay there all day, and the only that drove him to finally rise was knowing that he needed to be out there, working with others, and guaranteeing that above all she was safe, as were his children. He kissed her gently on the cheek before getting up, fully aware that she hadn't noticed the kiss.

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**AN: We've got a few more "character development" chapters to go, I think (if all goes as planned, but the story does take on a mind of its own) so hang with me if you're not into that sort of thing. **


	75. Chapter 75

Michonne couldn't sleep as well or as long as she wanted, and she hoped that she'd feel up to napping later, before she had to start night watch again. She'd been sticking close to Carol, watching the babies for the most part. She was really too tired to consider everything else.

Carol was not back to normal, not by a long shot, but she was better than she had been that morning sobbing in the overgrown grass. She was wondering around, almost with the same nature of the Walkers, attempting to move between rationing jobs and preparing to make something for a late lunch.

Sadie walked up, waving. She was carrying a notebook. She stopped in front of Michonne.

"Do you think that Daryl could call a meeting?" Sadie asked. "I have a plan, but I want to talk about it with everyone."

Carol overheard her.

"Daryl doesn't have to call a meeting," she said to Michonne. "I can do that."

She walked over to the gong that they used to signal most of the community whenever something was happening. There was no emergency, but it was guaranteed to draw the attention of everyone, except maybe Mark who was sleeping in his house.

Michonne pointed to the gong when Carol started beating it and then touched Sadie's arm to call her attention back.

"They'll all be here in a minute," she said.

Sadie signaled a thank you to Michonne and hung around waiting for everyone to show up.

Daryl was one of the first to arrive, followed by Tyreese with whom he'd spent most of the day.

"What's goin' on? What's the emergency?" Daryl asked coming up.

"No real emergency, just a sudden group meeting," Carol explained. "Sadie's got a battle plan that she wanted to talk to everyone about and I thought it might be a good idea to hear what she has to say."

"Fine," Daryl said. He was grateful for any suggestions given the fact that they really didn't have much of a strategy at this point.

Everyone except Mark slowly trickled in and filled the dining room where Sadie was spreading pieces of paper that she had drawn and written on over the table top.

"Come here," she said, gesturing to Daryl to come over.

Daryl walked beside her, as close as he could get, and studied it over her shoulders, not entirely sure of what she was trying to show him.

"So, what is it?" He asked.

"We go in as four groups," Sadie said. "Each group has a job."

"I'm listening," Daryl said.

Sadie turned and looked at Michonne who was leaning against the wall.

"Umm, who has the best speaking voice?" She asked.

Michonne walked over to the table.

"You mean to act as a spokesperson?" Michonne asked.

"Yes, to speak to the other group," Sadie explained. "Which man? This group, they won't take women seriously, it has to be a man."

Michonne thought about it for a minute.

"Probably Rick or Tyreese," she answered. She shot a glance at Daryl, but he didn't look bothered by her suggestions. She didn't want his accent affecting the seriousness of the message, if there was a message that they were planning on transmitting.

"OK," Sadie said, "good."

"Rick, then, you'll be here with your group," Sadie said, pointing to her poor drawing. "Just behind the wood line. You'll be covered, but they can hear you. You will try to negotiate with them to hand over the people they've kidnapped from other groups."

Rick, standing on Sadie's other side caught her attention.

"So we're going in to try to negotiate? I don't remember that being part of the plan," he said.

Sadie shook her head at him.

"No," she said, "you're going to make it _look_ like we're going in to negotiate. You will have Tyreese, Glenn, and Jimmy with you."

Daryl studied her more closely now. It was obvious that she had carefully thought about this and that her scribbles meant _something_. He was interested in seeing where this was going.

"I'm going to take another group," Sadie said. "I'll take Stella, Chelsea, and Beth. I've seen them in action, and they're not the strongest fighters that we have. They'll be better to go with me. We're going to cut a hole in the fence over here," she pointed to one side of the scribbles, "and we're going to go in the way I went before. We'll get our friends, they'll fight with us, so we'll pick up five people if they're all still there."

Daryl waved his hand in front of her face.

"What?" She asked.

"You think they might not be there?" He asked.

Sadie shrugged. "I don't know. I don't know what happened to the others," she explained. Daryl nodded his understanding.

"Maggie, you're going to lead another group. Your group is the smallest, sorry, but we'll be joining you as soon as we can," Sadie explained. "You'll come in from the other side with Rachel and Josh. We'll all be inside the fences, ready to attack, while they're still negotiating with Rick's group. They'll think they're dealing with a few people attacking from the front, they won't realize we're all inside. They'll rush their people to the front, so we'll be behind them, hiding when they start the attack."

Daryl tapped Sadie again.

"I don't know if you realize it, but you're missing something," Daryl said. "There's still a few of us not accounted for."

"I'll get to that," Sadie said, holding her hand up to him.

Daryl chewed at his thumb and waited for her to continue.

"Your group, Daryl, will have Beau, Junior, and Brenda. You'll be taking cues from Beau. You'll be hidden in the trees. When you see that our groups are inside, and I've signaled to you that we've got the others, then you'll signal Rick's group. They will start to attack the guards outside who will draw the others out and toward the front. Our groups will hit them from behind. Your group will hit them from above, and Rick's group will hit them from in front. Meanwhile, I'll make my way through, and I'll try to cut some of the fence down so that you can come in the front," Sadie said.

Sadie sighed and looked at Daryl.

"It sounds like it might actually work," Daryl said, "at least better than the plan we had before, which was basically run at them and pray for the best."

"Sadie's group should carry extra weapons, in case the five they pick up aren't armed," Glenn offered.

Sadie nodded at Glenn.

"No weapons," she said, "I know they don't have anything."

"I'm fighting," Carol said suddenly.

"What?" Michonne responded, everyone else was clearly shocked too.

"I'm fighting. Higher numbers means better odds of taking them out before they get any of us. I'm going in with Maggie's group and Maggie and I will cover Sadie when she's trying to clear passage for everyone else to get inside," Carol said.

"You've got to be here for when they get back," Michonne said. "What if someone gets hurt?"

"Then I'll take care of it when I get back," Carol said, "and Mark will be here."

No one spoke for a minute, but everyone looked at each other, trying to take in what Sadie had said.

"It's a plan," Maggie said, "and it's a plan that we didn't have before."

"OK," Daryl said, "we'll consider it the plan 'less anyone can come up with somethin' better 'fore we gotta go out there. If we keep with what Sadie told that other group I'm figurin' we gotta go tomorrow, or the next day at the latest."

"Let's go the day after tomorrow," Rick said. "Sadie's going to be there to get their attention, so they'll know she's with us. I think we could use an extra day, just to give everyone some time to cope with losing Sasha and to get ready to go into battle."

"Fine," Daryl said. "Then if y'all ain't got no problems, I reckon everyone can go get at what you got to do."

No one raised any issues for the time being, and everyone started shuffling around, most of them heading out of headquarters toward whatever activity they'd been working on.

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"Where are you going?" Michonne called after Carol as she followed her down the street.

"To train with Rick, my aim could use some brushing up," Carol said.

Michonne caught up to her and stopped her.

"Why are you doing this? You're supposed to stay here, you're not supposed to fight," Michonne said.

"We need all the people we can get, Michonne. I'm a _good_ fighter even though people want to forget that. I'm going out there to help," Carol said.

"You don't have to do this, Carol," Michonne said. "I'm not going to let you do this."

"Do what?" Carol asked. "I'm going to fight. You do what you need to do and I am going to do what I need to do. It could be _me_, it could be _my_ bullet that makes a difference out there. It could be the difference between someone we lose, and someone we don't lose. There's no need to argue with me, I'm going."

"I don't want you going out there and doing something stupid," Michonne hissed.

"I'm not going to do anything stupid, Michonne. I don't have a death wish, but I certainly don't want to lose anyone else. If we're going to fight, then I'm going to fight. You and Carl can help Mark get things ready, have everything ready for when I get back, for when we all get back," Carol said.

Michonne could see the resolve in Carol's face. There wasn't any arguing with her on this, she was determined not to be left behind, and Michonne didn't know what to say. Finally she dropped her hands from Carol's shoulders, not saying anything. Carol stared at her for a minute, sighed, and turned back the way she was walking, toward the area where Rick was working with others on target practice.

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That night Glenn was sure that they weren't getting any sleep, even though he knew that everyone was as exhausted as he was. Beth and Junior had come to join them, as well as Jimmy, declaring that none could sleep in the other house without Sasha. Jimmy had already decided that he'd rather sleep in the living room of their house than to go anywhere else.

"I've already been in too many houses," Jimmy protested. "None of them are the same anymore. Frank and Dora are gone, Dominique is gone, and now Sasha is gone too."

He'd held himself together pretty well to a point, at least to an outsider's perspective, but he was cracked now, and Glenn wasn't sure that crack would heal. Glenn couldn't put himself in Jimmy's shoes. The roll call of his life hadn't changed quite the way that Jimmy's had in quite the length of time lately and he didn't even want to lie to him and tell him that he could understand what he was going through. All he could do was try to hold together everyone that crowded into his house, everyone that couldn't sleep because losing Sasha meant something different to all of them.

For Jimmy, it seemed to mean that you should never get close to anyone anymore. That closeness just meant that you had sealed the deal that you would be without them and that silence and emptiness would take on a whole new meaning. For Junior it was similar, although the realization oddly drove him closer to Beth. He hadn't taken a hand off of her for the whole evening. For him, it seemed, it had mutated into some sort of belief that over the horizon, just outside of sight, loss lingered. He seemed to be trying to hold on desperately until that loss was upon him.

Beth, who had grown close to Sasha through their living environment, was even clingier with Maggie than usual, having begun to think of Sasha as another type of sister figure, and she was gone. There was no reason to believe that the upcoming battle might strip her of Maggie.

Maggie had always regarded Sasha as a friend, an equal, someone to tease and joke around with. Sasha had never proven herself to be someone they _expected_ to go, and Glenn could tell that was hitting Maggie especially hard. She had assumed that Sasha could handle things. She'd even admitted to Glenn, in the privacy of their own room, that she'd thought it would be Carol that wouldn't return from the hospital run when she'd thought the two had been lost. She'd never suspected it would be Sasha. It had her doubting everyone else, but worse than that, it had her doubting herself.

Glenn was beside himself. He had to hold it together. Those around him needed that, but he silently wondered when it would be _his_ turn and when he'd be finally allowed to express to the others what he had felt dealing with the losses they'd dealt with. He had dealt with them too, these were people that he had lost too, but he'd swallowed it back, trying to be strong for those who seemed to need that strength. He hoped the battle went well, because he didn't know how much more strength he had left. For now, though, he'd do all that he had to keep them all together, and hopefully to convince them all of getting some rest in light of their upcoming struggle.

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"Please," Tyreese argued, "don't do this, just stay here, where I don't have to worry about you, where I know you're _safe_."

"I'm not doing this to hurt you, I'm not doing it to hurt anyone," Carol argued. "I'm doing it because you've all seemed to have forgotten that I can do more than wash clothes and put Band Aids on boo boos. No one has let me do anything since…well, for a while."

Tyreese was clinging to her, stroking her hair, her arms, her back, whatever his hands fell on. She understood that he was upset, and that he was not having as easy of a time dealing with Sasha's loss as he pretended to be having, but she was determined not to let that sway her. She wanted him to understand that she wasn't someone that he had to look out for at all times, not someone she had to protect.

"I've got nothing left, Carol," Tyreese said. "Sasha was just a kid, and it was my job to take care of her and I let her down."

"You didn't let her down, Tyreese. No one thinks you let her down, and she wasn't a kid, and neither am I. Don't you think I'm terrified? What do I have left?" Carol countered.

"You've got me, you've got Judith, you've got Michonne, Daryl, and Hope…" Tyreese said.

"And don't you think, Tyreese, that if life somehow ever became _normal_, if we moved on, don't you think that Daryl and Michonne might get tired of me being that person that was always up under them? That person that had nothing else? Judith isn't even mine, Tyreese. You're all I've got for sure and you're willing to go in on the front lines, I'll just be in the background," Carol said.

"I can't handle it," Tyreese said, burying his face into Carol's neck. "I can't handle losing you right now."

"And I can't handle losing you," Carol said, "so I guess that just means we've both got to fight like hell, for the good of everyone, and especially for _each other_."

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Daryl felt like he was dying. His heart hurt as bad as every limb in his body. He couldn't sleep without Michonne. He was lying awake, wanting anything. He wanted the sound of her breathing, the touch of her skin, the feeling of her toenails, even, when she dug them into his shins searching for his legs at night. He'd have taken anything at this point.

The reality, though, was that his bed was empty and he was left babysitting Sadie who was babysitting the kids. Michonne was on night watch, and he hated it, every second of it. He decided a new rule was to be passed after this battle that she was never to have night watch again, unless it was with him. At least then, even if he was awake all night, he'd be awake in her presence instead of awake in his own bed, acutely aware that she wasn't with him.

He wanted all this behind them. The plan that Sadie had mapped out had started to grow on him. It had started to sound like something he could get behind. He wouldn't actually enter the battle until later, and that was strange for him, but it sounded like something that might actually work.

Daryl declared to himself then that if they made it through this, and he hoped they made it through with as little loss of people as possible, he was keeping his group safe, somehow, and locked away from the outside for as long as possible. All he wanted right now, and he was sure others agreed, was just a little time to sort it all out, to sort out all their feelings.

Daryl certainly didn't want anything else right now, except to spend his time figuring out how to make his family safe, and to spend the extra time that he had enjoying the comfort of feeling Michonne close to him, feeling his baby growing inside her, and watching all the changes that seemed to be happening so quickly to Hope. He was tired of loss, and he was tired of death. He was determined, in a couple of days, to take out this threat that might harm his loved ones, and then spend a while basking in the glow of safety and security that their little community had to offer.


	76. Chapter 76

"Is she _crazy_?" Mark asked Michonne while they were doing watch. He'd slept through Carol's decision to join the battle party and now MIchonne was filling him in on the plan and the fact that Carol was planning on leaving the two of them with Carl and three babies.

"Normally I would say no," Michonne responded, "but right now I'm not so sure." She wasn't attempting to hide at all the fact that she was worried about the whole thing and more than a little angry at Carol for trying to make some kind of point by being, at least in Michonne's opinion, completely reckless.

"I mean I can do the best that I can," Mark started, "but I really don't feel confident in my abilities to handle any kind of serious wounds."

"I don't know that she would always know what she was doing either, but she knows more than _I_ do," Michonne said. "She at least had a little training from Hershel."

"Who?" Mark asked.

"He was with us before," Michonne said.

"Can't you talk her out of it?" Mark asked.

"I tried to talk her out of it, but she's being hardheaded about the whole thing." Michonne responded.

"Well isn't your husband like the boss around here? Can't he _make_ her stay here? Declare it unconstitutional or something?" Mark asked.

Michonne snickered. "He's not the boss, and we don't really _make_ each other do anything. We don't have a constitution either."

"Well, I don't know, let's make one or make it a law or something that the medical personnel cannot leave the community in the face of a possible crisis," Mark said.

Michonne sighed. This just didn't make any sense to her, and she couldn't believe that no one else was attempting to put a stop to Carol's decision to just abandon her post here at the community, and that's what she would be doing. Her _job,_ her _position_ within the community involved preparing for whatever injuries would come back from that battle, not traipsing off to possibly be one of those injured, or even worse.

"I'll talk to her again tomorrow," Michonne said, "I'll see if I can talk some sense into her."

"I'll be keeping my fingers crossed," Mark said.

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"Daryl," Rick said, walking toward Daryl who was watching Sadie work with a few of the members with Walkers, "you might want to come here."

"What's going on?" Daryl asked, turning to face Rick.

"Your wives are fighting, and it looks like it could get serious," Rick said.

"My wives?" Daryl asked.

"Carol and Michonne are fighting, in the street, not far from where we were doing target practice. I couldn't find Tyreese, and I thought you might want to see if you can break it up," Rick said.

"Why didn't you just break 'em up?" Daryl asked, walking with Rick toward the area of conflict. "What they fightin' 'bout anyway?"

"As far as I could tell, they're fighting about Carol's decision to go out tomorrow, and I didn't want to get in the middle of it. It's really more your area when it comes to those two," Rick said.

Despite the fact he was discussing this fight with Daryl, he was smiling.

"What you smilin' 'bout?" Daryl asked.

"It's just kind of funny, you'll see when you get there. No one really knows what to do. We didn't expect to find Michonne and Carol going around in circles yelling at each other," Rick responded.

Daryl was used to the two women squawking at each other from time to time. He figured it was a woman thing. One of them would get irritated by some little thing the other one did and the next thing you knew they were going at each other, bickering. Sometimes the bickering was worse than others, and sometimes they were nastier with each other than others. Usually then you could count on an awkward period of time between them, the silent time, which Daryl always thought of as their cool down period. Once that had passed, they'd magically reappear again at some point, having made up or whatever it was they did and everything was fine and happy until someone got another hair.

As Rick and Daryl got closer, Daryl began to be able to discern the voices of the women and he could tell that this squabble was a little bit more intense than most of the ones that he'd overheard before ringing through the house or through headquarters.

"That is bullshit!" Michonne barked.

Daryl didn't hear if there was some response from Carol because they turned the corner and encountered the women just as Michonne barked something else at Carol.

"It's stupid, selfish pride, that's all it is!" She barked.

Daryl was a little struck when he first saw the scene. He wasn't sure what amused him more, the fact that everyone who had been working with Rick was forming a type of audience around the two women, or the fact that they were squared off at each other, somewhat walking in circles like they were really considering fighting. Daryl thought it was funny, also, because he _knew_ that Michonne wouldn't hit Carol and Carol wouldn't hit Michonne. They could possibly squawk at each other all day, but neither would dare to lay an unkind hand on the other.

Daryl stopped where he was to regard the women and snorted at them.

"See what I mean?" Rick asked. "Should we break them up?"

"It doesn't have anything to do with pride, Michonne," Carol growled back, elongating Michonne's name far more than was necessary. "It's got to do with helping the group, with trying to make sure that more people make it back. It's about maybe saving lives!"

"That's bullshit too!" Michonne barked back. "If it were about saving lives, then you'd stay here. _This_ is where you're saving lives, Carol, not out there. Even if they survive long enough to make it back here, Mark and I don't really know what we're doing, not like you do. What does it matter who you save out there if they just make it here to die? If you cared about saving lives, you'd stay here and be ready for them."

"Nah," Daryl said to Rick after a minute. "I don't think they gon' hurt each other, an' I think this is somethin' they gotta get out. We'll just keep an eye on 'em 'til they sort through it. If they do go at it, though," Daryl paused and looked around, noticing that Tyreese had not been drawn to the scene, "how about you get Carol and I'll get control 'a 'Chonne."

"Sounds like a plan," Rick said.

"So you're going to do it to? Go ahead and dig my grave like if I'm out there I won't be back here to help?" Carol hissed.

"No, Carol, I'm just being realistic. We don't know who will or won't make it back. Bullets don't discriminate. I should know, I've been shot more than my fair share of times! It can happen to anyone!" Michonne yelled back at her. "You said, when I got pregnant, that you were going to be there, you said we were doing this together, but I guess you're willing to abandon that now, right? Just so you can be hardheaded."

"Oh? You're giving me a lecture on being hardheaded? That's rich!" Carol responded, no less bitterly than Michonne. "I said I'd be back!"

"And if you're not? Maybe I die? Maybe the baby dies? It might be better if it happens that way, less for everyone to worry about, but you wouldn't care right, because you'd have _proved_ your point," Michonne said.

Daryl saw first the catch in Carol, the moment where she seemed to stop, at least for a second to consider what she'd just heard. He saw it next in Michonne, but it was different. She did stop, but she also turned and walked off. He followed her, not sure what to say, but sure that he should follow.

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"'Chonne! 'Chonne!" Daryl called, trying to catch up with Michonne who was making remarkably good time in getting back across the community. When he finally rushed ahead enough to grab her, he realized that she was upset, more than he'd thought when he'd gone chasing after her.

"Leave me alone," she said, jerking away from him.

"Don't pull away from me, 'Chonne," Daryl said. "Don'tcha ever pull away from me. You can tell me what'cha want to say, but don't pull away."

He held her hard, looking into her eyes which were overflowing now, but no sounds were escaping.

"I want to lie down," she sobbed.

"Fine, 'Chonne, I'll take ya to the house. That ain't no problem," Daryl said. He knew that wasn't the reason she was upset, but he was going to give her the time that she needed. He knew she'd talk to him, but she would only do it when she was ready to.

Daryl led Michonne quietly to the bedroom and got her in bed, stripping off her clothes and pretending that he didn't notice that she was fighting back being upset.

"You wanna talk about it?" He asked, when he had finally tucked her in and was sitting next to her.

Michonne was wearing the face that he hated. It was the face that she wore to try to tell him and the rest of the world that nothing affected her, nothing touched her, and he knew it to be fake.

"You can't pull that on me, 'Chonne. You two can kiss an' make up or whatever it is that you gals do, it ain't the end a' the world," Daryl said.

"Forget about it Daryl," Michonne said bitterly. "She can do what she wants, she's a grown ass woman, I don't care."

"Yeah, I believe that too, 'Chonne," Daryl said sarcastically.

Michonne didn't respond, she got into bed and rolled away from him, pulling the cover up. Daryl sighed. There was enough going on that he didn't want to deal with the two of them fighting like this. He decided he was going to have a talk with Carol, and with Tyreese if necessary, but he wasn't going to let this continue any longer.

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"Michonne, I brought you some dinner, wake up for a bit," Carol said, shaking Michonne's shoulder.

Michonne rolled over a little, trying to fully wake. For a moment she'd forgotten about the fight with Carol, forgotten her plans to go running off with others the next morning to fight some group they knew little about. Suddenly it washed back over her and she rolled back the way she was, hugging her pillow back up under her head and shutting her eyes.

"So you're not going to talk to me at all, is that it?" Carol asked. "Well the least you can do is sit up and eat."

"Not hungry," Michonne said.

"Michonne, look, I'm sorry," Carol said, "and I think we both said things we didn't mean."

"Oh no," Michonne said, "I meant everything I said."

Carol sighed. Michonne was probably angrier with her right now that she'd ever seen her before, and after talking to Daryl and Tyreese about it for a while, she was starting to think that she couldn't blame her. She wanted to go and fight, but deep down she wasn't entirely sure _why_ it was so important to her. Part of her wanted to prove to everyone else, prove to _herself_ that she hadn't been the reason that others seemed to die around her. She knew that she had killed her share of Walkers, and though she'd never killed another living person, she felt confident that she could if the need arose.

Yet something in her still doubted herself. She felt like she'd been witness to so many deaths, possibly responsible for them. She had failed to protect Sophia, T-Dog had sacrificed himself for her, and whether or not he was bitten and going to die, it still felt like he'd died because of her. Hershel had sacrificed himself for the group, but if she'd had enough foresight to be armed from the beginning it may not have come to that, she hadn't been able to do anything for Dora, and then Sasha had been lost, alone with her. Maybe Sasha wouldn't have been bit if she'd been with someone else, someone like Maggie, maybe it was because she was with Carol that these things had happened.

Carol wasn't sure at all what she thought that fighting would prove, or what it would do for her, but she had felt certain at the time that it was a good idea, something that she needed to do.

Now she didn't feel that way. Now she realized that her decision to fight had seemed, to Michonne like a betrayal. She could see that Michonne thought of it as, if not a total suicide attempt, at least a possibility, and Michonne saw that as Carol abandoning her, saying that she didn't care, and it wasn't true. Carol had never had a friend like Michonne before. The thought of actually betraying her seemed impossible. The knowledge that Michonne was as angry, or even as hurt, as she was now stung for Carol

"I talked to Daryl," Carol said. "I'm not going, Michonne. I never meant to hurt you, and I'm not going. I'm going to stay here and get things ready for when they get back. I'm not walking away from you and this baby, either."

"So glad that _Daryl_ could talk some sense into you," Michonne said, not moving to face Carol.

Carol sighed.

"Ok," she said. "I deserve this. Can you do me a favor though? Can you just eat your dinner now, get some rest, and hold off being angry with me until after tomorrow? When everything's calm again I promise that you can be as angry with me as you like, right up until it's time for the baby, and that gives you quite a few months to make me pay for this," Carol said.

Michonne rolled over then.

"I don't want to make you _pay_ for anything," she said. She obviously didn't really want to talk about it any further, and Carol could somewhat understand that.

Carol sighed again. "I'm sorry if I hurt your feelings," she offered.

Michonne didn't say anything. She wasn't ready to say anything right now. She wasn't really _mad_ at Carol, but she was hurt. She knew that she'd get over it, but she wasn't going to instantly get over it. She needed a little more time to process it. Michonne sat up and accepted the food that Carol offered her. She could see that there were tears brimming in Carol's eyes, and part of her wanted to comfort her, but the other part of her felt like Carol had caused them herself.

"Fine, you eat and get some rest," Carol said, starting to get up.

"I've got watch in a bit," Michonne responded.

"I'll do watch tonight," Carol said.

"No, you won't," Michonne countered. "You need to rest to be alert tomorrow, more than I do."

Carol sighed again.

"Fine," she said. "You eat and I'll send Daryl up. I think he wants to spend a little time with you tonight. Then I'll come and get you after a while and I'll sleep while you finish off watch."

"Fine," Michonne responded.

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Michonne woke up when she heard the knocking on the door that woke her. She had only been lightly sleeping, whereas Daryl was snoring as though he hadn't slept in a few nights.

"Come in," she whispered.

Carol opened the door and stuck her head in.

"Are you ready?" Carol asked.

"Yeah, I will be in a few minutes," Michonne said, gently lifting Daryl's arm and attempting to escape from his grasp without him realizing she was gone. She slid her pillow into place under his arm, hoping it would keep him from waking. He needed this sleep apparently, almost as much as he had needed the release that he'd gained earlier.

"Mark is out there, so he'll be fine while you get ready," Carol whispered. "Nothing much is going on outside."

Michonne struggled to get dressed by the lamplight, aware that Carol was still in the doorway, and unashamedly watching her. Michonne didn't care. Finally she gathered up her katana, which she'd been allowed to take with her own watch, and started toward the door.

"Where is Sadie?" Michonne asked, glancing at the empty pallet on the floor.

"She's sleeping in my room so that Tyreese and I can wake her," Carol said.

"Poor woman has been sleeping on the floor like a dog for three nights," Michonne said. "I'm sure she'll be glad when all this madness is over."

Carol snickered.

"I think we will all be glad when it's over," Carol said.

Michonne closed the bedroom door and the two of them stood in the hallway a little awkwardly, the lamp illuminating the space.

"So are you talking to me now?" Carol whispered.

"Yeah, Carol, I'm talking to you," Michonne said with a sigh.

"Do you forgive me?" Carol asked, trying not to smile.

Michonne sighed.

"I forgive you," she said. She paused a moment and then pointed her finger at Carol's face. "I'm going to tell you this, though, if you pull some shit like that ever again, I'm not going to forgive you again," Michonne said.

Carol did smile then.

"I promise," she said.

Michonne wrinkled her brow a little, trying to fight back smiling at the expression on Carol's face.

"Get your ass to sleep," she said, finally, "we have a hell of a day tomorrow."

Carol nodded and started toward her room as Michonne started down the stairs.

"Oh, and Michonne?" Carol called a moment later. Michonne stopped her descent.

"Yeah?" She asked, lifting the lamp a little.

"I really am sorry," Carol said.

"Me too," Michonne said, turning without another word and heading out to join Mark for watch.


	77. Chapter 77

AN: OK, I'm not going to lie. Battle scenes are hard to write, at least for me. I feel like the visionary aspect of television makes them much easier. I did the best I could, though, and I hope it at least gets the point across. I know it's not the best, but I hope it will do.

I am going to have some fluff for you for a bit. It's been heavy for a few chapters and I think we all need a break.

Again, I apologize if you're not pleased with this chapter. It was hard to write and isn't what I wanted entirely, but for now it's what I can offer you. Again, action really isn't my strong point.

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Breakfast was silent for everyone. No one really wanted to chat about what they were going to do. It was already clear that everyone was going to eat, gather their weapons, and they would leave the community in one large mass, only splitting into their smaller groups as they neared the school where their battle would begin.

It was also no secret that everyone was nervous. Most of them wore it painted on their faces. Others were keeping close to their loved ones.

Carol knew her work would begin as soon as they left. She was going to start getting things ready, giving Mark time to take a nap. Michonne had offered to stay up and help her with as much as she could, though Carol had tried to tell her that she needed to sleep. Michonne protested that she wouldn't be able to sleep anyway, knowing they were all out there, and if she kept watch over the babies that would mean that it would also free Carl up to help Carol arrange whatever she had in mind for the make shift hospital area that she was turning headquarters into at the time.

Carol looked sadly on the group. She could only hope that when they came back, they _all_ came back, and that they only brought with them wounds that she could treat. She didn't think they could bear the losses right now. She cursed a little the sad state of the breakfast that she was serving them, worried that it might be the last meal for some.

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Michonne, Mark, Carol, and Carl waited by the gates as everyone gathered there, straggling up, some still loading their weapons, some still strapping them on. Sadie and her group were doubly armed to prepare for the need to pass weapons to the new people that they would encounter to fight with them.

Michonne held Hope and the baby while Judith stood beside her. Her other three companions stepped outside the gate, taking out whatever Walkers started ambling up.

As people passed through, everyone said goodbye. It was a light goodbye, as though none of them wanted to admit in the slightest that they might not be passing back through these gates again. Just inside, Sadie stopped to rub the top of baby Paul's head and reached a hand up to touch Michonne on the cheek, smiling at her. She'd stop again momentarily to tell those outside goodbye as well. Tyreese stopped outside to kiss Carol and Daryl lingered a moment, hugging Michonne to him, careful not to squish either of the children in her arms. He kissed her and then kissed Hope on the forehead who didn't seem to understand why he wouldn't take her.

"You stay with ya ma right now, Daddy's gon' be back later," he said, rubbing her head. "Love ya, 'Chonne," Daryl said.

"I love you too," Michonne said, fighting back tears. "Come back?"

"Always," Daryl said with a smile. "We just gotta go do this right now, 'Chonne, but we'll be back 'fore ya know it."

Michonne smiled at him, but she didn't say anything. She watched him pass, with the others, out of the gates and across the street, slowly disappearing into the woods.

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Daryl hung back a bit with his group, selecting carefully the trees that they would get in. They needed to be close enough to hit targets, but well hidden enough to remain unseen warriors in the battle. He felt strange not taking his place as close to the line of fire as Rick's group had chosen, but they were sticking with the formation that Sadie had described to them, no one really feeling confident enough to come with another plan.

He scurried into his tree, lifting his binoculars to get a better view of everyone else. He could barely see Sadie's group off to the side, still hidden in the trees, waiting for her to give the command to move forward. Turning in the other direction, and looking around Beau, he could barely see Maggie, who was also waiting a moment to take her group in.

Rick was just below Beau, his entire group well covered for the moment's time.

In the yard of the school, two men patrolled. Daryl thought they looked tired, and he wondered if they could pick them off before Rick even started the fake negotiations that were to take place. That would take two people out, but it may also make it more difficult for Sadie and Maggie to do what they had planned, so he decided not to sniper the two men.

Just as Daryl noticed Sadie making her way with her group, all moving slowly and low to the ground to draw as little attention as possible, he realized that Rick must have seen it as well. Rick had begun to call out to the men that were guarding. Trying to catch their attention and draw them in, away from any chance of noticing either of the groups that were moving forward, each with a leader that was responsible for cutting fences and keeping their helpers from being attacked by Walkers.

Daryl paid no attention to the words that Rick was exchanging with the other men. They weren't of any importance anyway, just hollow lies that Rick had thrown together to buy time. Daryl was more focused on Sadie's group, since it was the one that would give the signal to start the entire thing. He had to call down to Rick whenever it was time, and then the battle would be on. The plan was kill anyone who wasn't with their group, or wasn't one of the tagged "new" members that Sadie brought out. He only hoped he could easily identify the new ones from his perch and didn't snag anyone not destined to die. He had already come to terms with the fact that this group could contain any number of women and children, and if they shot against his people, they had to be shot. That was just the way that the world was, as unfair as it seemed.

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Sadie's group had moved quickly, and they'd gotten inside. Once they'd emerged with the people that she'd gone in to find, she flagged Daryl's group from the far end of the fenced area with a white cloth that she'd worn tucked in her belt. That was the signal. The fake, and somewhat forced, discussion below was no longer necessary. They were ready. The slaughter must begin.

Daryl whistled quietly to Rick, once, twice, three times. Then he raised the rifle he was carrying, took aim, and fired at one of the guards that was talking to Rick. Almost simultaneously a shot rang out from somewhere which dropped the other. Now they only had to wait for the others to spill into the yard.

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Slowly at first the yard began to fill with others who came to investigate the shots they'd heard ring out. The first handful of individuals that ventured out did so timidly, not knowing where the shots came from or what they meant. They hadn't been alerted by their guards, so they had no immediate reason to assume that they were under attack.

That was lucky, and the group didn't waste any time in clearing out those that trickled out at first. Barely had the doors they came from closed before they were picked off, the source of the bullets unknown equally to those who dealt them and to those who received them.

The second round to emerge, however, after the gunfire was less timid. It was probably clear, then, that the gunshots were not random and not fired haphazardly in some surrounding area. They rushed out in a mob, running toward the fence, firing into the wooded area, where Rick and his group were seeking cover and firing from behind their chosen trees.

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Rick knew that the plan was that his group would stay protected, behind the trees, taking out the other group's members that were closest to the fence, until they saw Sadie who was supposed to cut the fences in front of them to allow them passage. It was a suicide position, and he knew that much, but he suspected that she did too.

Rick was also beginning to worry that things had gone sour inside the fences. They were steady picking off people, and he knew for a fact that no one in his group was hit, nor was anyone above them, but he knew nothing about those on the inside. They were supposed to be fighting from behind, coming toward those of them in the front, but he couldn't see any of them. He couldn't distinguish any noises or any voices, except that once he'd heard the sound of what he called Maggie's "battle cry" ringing through the air. That was the only sound that had carried so far, over all the gunfire and shouting.

Finally he saw Sadie emerge from the crowd. For a moment he saw her locked in a hand to hand fight with a man that had somehow caught her. It looked bad for a moment and instinctively Rick had run forward, firing a shot into the man's skull, and dropping back behind the tree that had been offering him cover.

Sadie had rushed forward, starting quickly to cut the fences, just as she'd promised she would do, and suddenly he realized that at least three of them were attempting to cover her. She made her way, cutting the fence to a point where someone could squeeze through, and Rick rushed forward, realizing how many Walkers were descending upon them, luckily most were driven by the blood of the dying to flocking the fence. As he tried to come through the hole, Sadie reached around him hacking at the Walkers that threatened to grab at him. He threw her a "thank you" before making it fully inside and launching out into battle with the others around him, unaware now of what his group was doing. He only later realized that she hadn't heard his thanks and hoped he could repeat them later, when she would be aware of them.

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Daryl watched as so much happened below them. They were taking out as many people as they could, reloading as quickly has hands and fingers would allow. People in the fenced in area were dropping quickly, and he'd seen Rick's group move in, one at a time, dropping even more. The people he could see still fighting were familiar to him and he felt optimistic, at least for moment, trying to ignore the carnage surrounding him.

_They were winning, they were wiping out the threat, and his people were mostly standing, still fighting…sometimes hand to hand, sometimes with guns, but they were fighting._

Daryl finally thought it was time to take his group in, time to help those that were more exhausted inside the fences. He whistled to his crew and got down from his perch, recognizing that they were coming behind him. He quickly made his way toward the hole that had been prepared for them, stabbing the approaching Walkers as quickly as they came.

Inside the fences, the damage was obvious. The air was thick with gun smoke and the smell of blood. Daryl had to keep his wits about him to step over the bodies, some dead, others injured, and to fight those that approached him, eager to gain some sort of vengeance for the slaughter that had occurred here…a slaughter brought on by his people.

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"There's a lot here," Mark said to Carol, having organized as well as he could the contents of the hospital bags that they had brought back. "I don't know what we'll see, but we're prepared for anything that I think I could handle."

They'd arranged headquarters in such a way that the kitchen would serve to treat two at a time. There really wasn't more room than that available, and not really more hands that could do too much patching up. The living area would be a type of holding bin, not knowing really what they would be facing.

Michonne had offered, though exhausted, to prepare some kind of meal. They would be starving and she knew those that came back from battle would be famished. She tried to busy herself in preparation, trying not to pay attention to the time displayed by the sky nor to the time that she felt her body trying to keep track of. They'd be back, and everyone there had to be ready. To think anything else would be to drive each and every one of them to insanity with worry over those they cared about.

_They'd be back, they'd all be back._

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It seemed like a dizzying amount of time had passed when Tyreese gladly separated the head from the body of the man that he'd come up against last. He stood there, for a moment, aware that he was sticky in blood from the conflict. In the dirty air around him he saw only familiar faces, and none that were aiming at him nor running at him with any number of assorted weapons that he'd seen throughout the day.

He was also aware that he ached. Everything inside him throbbed. He didn't want to believe, for even a moment, that they'd exhausted what this camp had to offer. There was a heavy moment where everyone and everything was silent. No one stirred even a muscle. Finally it was done, the deed was done, and everyone started stumbling about again, hugging those that were still standing, not even noticing the sticky coat of human blood that covered most everyone.

The battle had been exhausting. It had been something that all of them had tried to go at blindly. Kill or be killed, but don't think about it. That had been the motto. It seemed as though it had worked, though.

Tyreese watched as Daryl and a few others went about, trying to stab the heads of all those who were enemies but weren't yet dead, as well as those who were dead, but they didn't need coming back as Walkers.

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"I'll take him," Sadie said to Rick, approaching him in the field of bodies. "I owe it to him," she said.

Rick moved out of her way and watched as she angrily drove her machete into one of the deceased. Rick decided not to question her about her aggression and moved on to another body.

Daryl followed closely behind Rick, assuring that everyone was down that needed to be put down. Out of the five people that Sadie had reported that they would rescue, Daryl could already count that he had put down three, their flags tied around their arms and their injuries having already brought on death. He wondered if they'd bring anyone knew out of this, until he saw Sadie waving her flag and trying to draw attention.

Daryl wandered over to where she was. The man she was standing over was injured, but Daryl didn't judge it to be fatal immediately, thinking that it was only a small side wound at best. He was flagged.

"He's hurt," she said, "but not dead."

The man moved then and Daryl realized they hadn't planned yet how they would evacuate the injured ones they intended to try to keep alive.

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The group moved the injured the best they could, most of them being piled on doors or any such other debris that they could scavenge from the place as gurneys. They had a distance to trek with them, and those that were carrying the injured had to be backed up by those that would flank them and kill the Walkers that approached, drawn by the sound of gunfire and the smell of blood.

Out of the other group, Daryl thought, they'd only rescued one. The others had died, and one was inexplicably missing. Out of their own group, a few were injured, but he hadn't judged them to be fatal. No one was gut shot, at least. The worst he saw was Maggie, and he feared that at the worst she would lose the use of her right arm, but he had faith that Mark and Carol wouldn't let that happen.

As they slumped back through the woods, supporting the injured as best they could and keeping the Walkers at bay, there was a feeling of victory mixed with that of guilt because of the slaughter that they had left behind. They fully intended to return another day, the sinking sun not in their favor today, to raid the camp, so everyone that had been killed or injured that didn't belong to their group had been put down. It had been such a staggering sight that no one had bothered to count the casualties. No one had wanted to give such a tally to the humanity of their group.

At this point no one wanted more than to make it back with those that were injured, see them patched up, eat something, and sink into beds, trying to forget the carnage they'd seen. Daryl was among that number, grateful that he'd suffered no injuries, but more than a little sorry for all the blood that had been shed.

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Michonne had taken the position of handling those that were injured, but not seriously injured enough to have come back through the gates unescorted. She had no idea what she was doing, but while Mark and Carol did their part dealing with some bullet wounds and severe gashes, she'd done what she could cleaning and bandaging minor cuts and scrapes and even handling a few stitches. She was surprise when Glenn, who had suffered a decent gash to the side but had insisted on helping Maggie back, didn't protest at all to her five stiches and the declaration that they would watch the wound for infection.

Most who had come back had eaten something, whether by their own accord or by having the food brought to them. Michonne was more than happy to deliver food, elated that they had suffered no casualties, at least to people that they knew.

Out of the group they'd gone to rescue, one had survived, that was all, but at least the threat of the hostile group was gone and so far there was no more mourning to be done in the community than there was before they'd exited the gates that morning.

Those who were uninjured, or relatively uninjured, took those they could move back to their homes. They made sure they were comfortable before heading somewhere to collapse themselves.

Everyone who had gone out looked exhausted, and Michonne could second their emotion. She'd even been responsible for cleaning and dressing a small knife wound which had required a few stitches for Daryl. He'd protested her worry the entire time saying it was nothing, and that he'd suffered far worse. She didn't doubt it, but his hissing at the three stitches in his shoulder were still more than she wanted to hear.

Finally when it surreally seemed like the threat was over and everyone was "resting," Michonne found herself collapsing into one of the chairs in headquarters.

"Let's go to bed," she heard Carol say, her voice seeming distant. "I need it and you need it to, come on."

Michonne felt Carol tug at her, pull her to her feet. She couldn't believe it was time to go to bed, even as they stepped into the pitch blackness of the night. She didn't know what time it was, didn't know how long they'd been patching things up, but just the thought that was over didn't seem quite right.

Michonne leaned on the other woman, though in her mind she knew that Carol was exhausted too. Anytime there was anything to support her weight, she tried to pull herself off of Carol's delicate frame, afraid she might weigh too much for her to support.

The last thing she remembered was sinking into the bed, though she had little memory of how she'd arrived all the way there.

Daryl was snoring, and she helped Carol get herself out of as much of her clothing as was possible, fighting off the sleep that was invading her senses. Daryl's arm had almost instinctively closed in upon her, drawing her near him, and she had wanted nothing more than to give up entirely and sink into that comfort. He had come back. They had all come back. At this moment it felt like it must be a dream that the threat was over and they could once again just relax and bask in what they had built together…but even if it was a dream, it was one she wanted to enjoy for a bit. She felt the coolness of Carol's lips on her forehead, and heard her whisper something, though she couldn't make out what, just as she'd slipped entirely into the feeling that was enveloping her.


	78. Chapter 78

AN: This chapter begins a few in a series of fluff/character development chapters. I hope you enjoy. There are a number of things I'd like to explore here, so that's where we're going. Some will be shorter, others will be longer, most depend in length on what's going on in my real world.

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Michonne stretched in bed for a moment, savoring how soft the sheets and blankets and pillows felt. The mornings that she woke up, on her own, when she wanted to get up, the bed felt absolutely heavenly. She rolled around in it for a moment, hugging the pillows, smelling Daryl's sent on his abandoned pillow. She got up, pulled on her robe and tied it shut, slipping out the bedroom and into the nursery. Both of the girls were gone and it appeared the house was empty. Michonne slipped back into the bedroom and fumbled through the clothes that she had that fit right now, trying to find something she felt like wearing.

When she was dressed, she slipped out the house and headed toward headquarters. Entering the door she found Sadie lying on the couch with the baby she'd claimed tucked in her arms. She smiled at Michonne and Michonne walked over a second, leaning over her.

"You've taken up residence on the couch at headquarters?" Michonne asked. Sadie didn't respond to her immediately.

"Someone decided to wake up this morning with a raging fever," Carol called from the kitchen area. Michonne could hear the clink of things that Carol was apparently putting away. "Mark dosed her with antibiotics, but she seems to think that she can go trotting off to the fields to work. Keeping her here is the only way that I can make her let me keep an eye on her."

"It's better not to fight with her," Michonne said to Sadie. "Somehow you always end up losing."

Sadie giggled.

"I know," she said.

"Where is everyone?" Michonne called to Carol.

"Those who are only slightly injured are mostly in the fields. Mark and Rachel are checking on the injured," Carol answered. It had been three days since the battle and people were just starting to seem recovered from the fatigue, less likely from their injuries.

"Where are Hope and Judith?" Michonne asked.

"Your daughter," Carol started, "is with her Dada because apparently he's the only one whose soul she doesn't think should burn right now."

"What?" Michonne asked.

"She's cutting a new tooth, I think," Carol explained. "She's completely inconsolable and thinks that I am Satan incarnate. Daryl's the only one that she wanted anything to do with at breakfast this morning, and she's still made him feel guilty for not doing anything to fight the cruel injustice that's being done to her."

Michonne laughed. Carol walked over, putting her hand on Sadie's head.

"You feel cooler," Carol said.

"I feel fine," Sadie responded.

"You may, but you're still staying put," Carol said. "Hope has her mother's temper, doesn't she?"

Sadie laughed and looked at Michonne.

"Oh no," she said, "I'm not getting into this."

Michonne wasn't bothered by the comment.

"Where do you want me?" Michonne asked.

"Actually, I could use you here a bit. I'm stocking the kitchen area as a medicine room, or something like that. Can you help me finish putting away everything that's left in the bags? We never got it all put away, but now we can afford the luxury of being organized," Carol said.

Michonne followed her back into the kitchen area and took over with one of the bags, putting things where they should go as best she could. She was mostly trying to match things to what Carol had already started putting away. The bags had been stuffed, and there was still a lot left, despite what they had used to treat everyone after the battle.

"If Hope's with Daryl, where's Judith?" Michonne asked, packing some bottles onto a shelf.

"Tyreese took her. They went with Rick and Glenn down to examine one of the columns. It seems that a herd must have passed through and tried to push in. It crumbled part of a column and they've gone down to see about reinforcing it, making sure it can stand up to such a threat," Carol explained.

Michonne snickered to herself, realizing that discussing things like battles and Walker herds had become as ordinary to their everyday conversation as discussing office gossip had once been to her life.

Mark came through the doors a few minutes later, stopping to check on Sadie and then passing into the kitchen.

"Maggie's looking better," he said. "I saw Glenn too. I know he went down to look at the fences with Tyreese and Daryl, but if he knows anything he'll listen to me and take it easy a few days. His wound isn't serious, but he could use a break."

"Glenn's not too hard headed," Carol said. "Sadie's fever broke and she seems less loopy than she was this morning."

"Good, that's what I like to hear," Mark said.

"What about Maggie?" Michonne asked. She knew that Maggie's injury had everyone a little worried at first. It had kept her firmly inside her house since the battle.

"Looking much better," Mark said, eating a granola bar he rummaged out of a box on the counter. "She's going to be fine, but she'll need some rest and then a little therapy. I don't think the damage is going to be anything lasting. Now that Seth fellow I'm still not sure about."

"Seth?" Michonne asked.

"New guy," Carol responded.

_Ah, yes_, Michonne thought. _The new guy, the lone ranger._ The man had been the only one they'd actually rescued from the other group, though he hadn't come from Sadie and Mark's group. Daryl had thoroughly interrogated him once, but his wound was pretty serious and they didn't want him to go through too much until he was a little stronger. Michonne thought that his wound, sadly, wouldn't have been very serious once upon a time, but given the skill of their two resident surgeons, things were more touch and go than they once were.

"Rachel is with him now," Mark said. He caught Michonne's eye and gave her a smirk. "She's quite the nurse to Seth," he added.

Carol also looked smug for a moment.

"You don't think," Michonne started, "not with that injury…"

"No, no, nothing like that," Mark said. "At least not yet. I'm just saying that they're awful chatty."

"What about Rick?" Michonne asked.

Carol looked at her smugly again.

"Rick seems to have developed some interests of his own, let's just say that he's been extra concerned about others himself," she said.

"Who?" Michonne asked.

Carol didn't say anything, but she did nod her head in the direction of the living room where Sadie was occupying the couch and Mark snickered.

"How's that going to work?" Michonne asked.

Carol shrugged.

"I don't know, but I'm guessing we might get the chance to see the first voluntary end of the world break up that we've ever seen," Carol said.

"I just hope there isn't any drama," Mark said. "Let's face it, you can't get the distance between two people that you used to be able to get. There's no room around here for catty bitches."

Mark crumpled up the wrapper he was holding and put it in the trash bag with the rest of the stuff that Carol was planning on burning later. Without a word he plucked a few more things from the cabinets and trotted out the door.

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Tyreese and Rick had done most of the work patching up the column and checking the fence. Glenn had been somewhat "overseeing" the operation, resting nearby, as had Daryl, who was busy keeping an eye on an all too busy Judith and soothing a grumpy Hope.

When they'd finished working on the fence, and dinner was on the horizon, Tyreese had gathered up the tools in the bag they had and had taken Judith and Glenn and headed back toward headquarters. Rick had slowed Daryl up, ignoring momentarily that Daryl was anxious to find Michonne and see if she could get Hope to stop chewing on her hand and giving him the evil eye.

"Daryl, what do you think about Sadie?" Rick asked.

Daryl looked at him, puzzled, and shifted Hope to his other side.

"I ain't thought much about her," Daryl said. "What do ya mean?"

"If Michonne wasn't your wife, what would you think of her?" Rick asked.

Daryl looked even more puzzled.

"But 'Chonne _is_ my wife," he argued.

"I know, but if she weren't, would you think Sadie was someone that, well…that you might think about getting _involved_ with?" Rick asked. They were slowly making their way back, staying a good distance behind Tyreese and Glenn.

"You interested in her?" Daryl asked after a minute.

Rick just looked at him. Daryl smiled.

"What about Rachel?" Daryl asked.

Rick sighed. "You know I don't care about Rachel," Rick said. "I never have, really."

"You gon' tell her that?" Daryl asked.

"I guess I'm going to have to tell her something," Rick said. He'd been putting off telling Rachel anything because until now there hadn't been anyone that he was interested in, but he had to admit that Sadie had his attention. She was beautiful, that much he was sure was obvious to everyone, and he liked her spirit. It was only an added bonus that Carl seemed to like her and seemed drawn to her.

"I reckon so," Daryl said. He didn't know much about women, but he hoped that Rachel wouldn't take it too hard if Rick told her that he'd found another squirrel he'd rather tree than her. "If you gon' lay a claim to her, though, you better get to it soon. I think Beau has his own interest in her, if you know what I mean," he added.

"Beau?" Rick asked. "He's interested in Sadie?"

Daryl smiled.

"He talks 'bout her enough that I reckon he is," Daryl said. "You just might get a move on it, that's all."

"Beau's just a kid," Rick said, smiling.

"He might be a yearlin', but he's ruttin' just the same," Daryl said. "Don't mean she won't take notice if she don't know you ain't interested."

Rick dropped back a moment, taking in what Daryl had said.

"You don't really think she'd be interested in Beau, do you?" Rick called at Daryl who was making good time in front of him, Hope's complaints spurring him on.

"I gotta find my woman, you just get ta thinkin' 'bout what you want. Things don't last long these days!" Daryl called back, not slowing down.

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By the time that Michonne got Hope to go to sleep and got ready for bed, she was ready for some sleep. She came into the room and fumbled around in the lamplight searching for her night gown.

"You gon' wear somethin' ta bed?" Daryl whined.

"I'm tired, Daryl," Michonne said. "Even if I come to bed naked I'm not in the mood."

Daryl snickered at her.

"That's fine, 'Chonne, but don't put nothin' on. I like ya better at night when I can feel ya without all that other mess," Daryl said.

Michonne turned, smiling at him and stopped her search for a minute. She hesitated before heading to bed.

"I promise, 'Chonne, I ain't gon' try nothin'." Daryl said, grinning.

Michonne finally crawled in bed and Daryl ushered her to snuggle against him, which she did willingly.

"Can I rub ya?" Daryl asked. Michonne knew what he meant and reached around him, drawing his arm around her and leading his hand to her belly. The action was common and comforting. "I think Rick likes Sadie," he said after a minute.

"The grapevine says you might be right," Michonne said.

"What you think 'bout that?" Daryl asked.

Michonne thought about it a few minutes.

"Well, if everyone is right there's a chance that Rachel might be interested in the new guy. I just hope there isn't some kind of drama. I think Sadie could be good for Rick, though. She's pretty grounded, and life hasn't kept her down yet. Who knows what she could do for him?" Michonne responded, hugging her pillow tighter under her head.

"I'm glad we ain't gotta deal with that," Daryl said, after a minute. "I wouldn't like ya tradin' me out for nobody new," he added.

"And I wouldn't want you to trade me out," Michonne said, echoing his thoughts. "But I think we're a different kind of couple than Rick and Rachel were," she explained. "They were more a couple out of convenience."

"What are we, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked.

"We're lifers, Daryl. We're stuck with each other, I think," Michonne said.

Daryl hugged her closer and kissed the back of her neck.

"I sure do like it that way, 'Chonne," he said.

"Me too, Daryl," Michonne said, smiling to herself and placing her hand gently over his.


	79. Chapter 79

**AN: Well, I gauge a lot by reviews, but since everyone is on hiatus, I'm on my own here. I love character development, so that's where I'm going for a while. That means there's some Dixonne, surely, but there is other stuff too. I hope you enjoy, since there's no indication you'll have any problem with that!**

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Daryl had already informed Michonne that he was going hunting, and his goal was to slip out of the community unnoticed. He didn't intend to go far, but he _did_ intend to go alone. He wanted a little time out in the woods by himself, and he was feeling confident knowing that there was less of a threat in the area. He'd go out, find a little something to add to their smokehouses, and spend a little time alone with his thoughts, which were mostly pleasant these days and circled around his growing family and the fact that he was fairly certain they were safe for quite a while.

Carl caught him before he could slip out though, and drew attention to the scene by not only asking Daryl where he was going, but insisting that he go with him.

"Look, Carl, I'm sure you good enough to go out now, but I ain't even takin' Beau with me. I'm goin' out alone 'cause I wanta be alone, ain't got nothin' to do with you, why don'tcha go find Beau an' see what he's doin'?" Daryl tried to explain.

The requests from the boy had already gained the attention of Carol of Sadie both, who had joined them near the gates.

"I thought you said we shouldn't be going out there alone?" Carl questioned.

"Y'all shouldn't be goin' out there alone, but I'm used to this stuff. I ain't gon' be gone long and I ain't gon' be goin' far. I'll be back in just a little bit. You run on now, I ain't got time for this," Daryl argued, essentially dismissing Carl. He started out the gates, throwing back the promise that the next time he went out, he would take Carl with him.

When Daryl left, Sadie could see Carl's face sink. She hadn't entirely understood what the problem was, but whatever it was, Carl was disappointed. He turned and started down the street in the direction of where his house was located, and also in the direction of Sadie's house. She didn't say anything to Carol, but she followed not far behind him.

Sadie finally called to Carl as they got farther down the street and the boy turned around to see what she wanted. She jogged over to catch up with him.

"Hey," she said, putting her hand on his shoulder, "what's wrong?"

"Daryl won't take me hunting with him," Carl explained. "He said I could go if I got good at using the bow, and I'm real good at it now, even Beau said so."

Sadie stood there a moment, thinking.

"Hey, would you like if I taught you something that could help you hunting? Something Daryl and Beau don't know? You could teach them," she offered to Carl.

"What do you know about hunting?" Carl asked.

"A little bit," Sadie offered. "I can teach you to talk to people without making any noise."

Carl looked at her a minute.

"Sign language," she said, smiling. Carl responded with a smile of his own.

"OK," he said.

"You want to learn?" She asked.

"Sure!" Carl said.

"Come on, we'll go sit on my porch. I will teach you the alphabet first. Then you can spell what you can't say," Sadie said.

Carl seemed excited and went with her eagerly to get started on their lesson. Sadie paused a moment, but decided that the baby would be fine with Carol and the others. She'd know where to find her, it wasn't like they had all that far to wander around here.

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Rick was wandering back through the part of the community that they occupied, meaning to check up on Carl, when he saw that he was thoroughly entertained by Sadie. He stopped a moment, a little down the street, and watched the two. From a distance he could tell that Sadie was apparently trying to teach the boy sign language, and from the grin on his face he found it preferable to any of the reading or math lessons that Rick subjected him to from time to time, considering both skills that everyone needed to know, at least in their most basic forms, regardless of the fact that it was the end of the world.

He continued on after a minute, considering some of the possible ways that he'd constructed to breach a conversation with Rachel that would leave him both single, and without any hard feelings from the woman that he felt had little more interest in him than he had in her. They'd just sort of ended up together, not so much out of desire as out of the obviousness of the situation. He was single, she was single, and they both had certain needs and desires that the other could fulfill. At first she had been clingy to him, but he had since realized it had more to do with the fact that he was something _new_ to her and with the fact that there were still single women sauntering around than it had to with any real affection. Lately their relationship had become even less interesting than something _mechanical_. Still, it was a difficult topic to bring up.

Rick was also starting to realize how little he knew about Sadie. Most of the things he knew about her wouldn't be enough to fill even a half a piece of paper if he were to make a list. He knew she was deaf, had travelled with Mark for some time, had some beef with a few other groups that had passed through their camp, including the one that his group had annihilated, and that she wasn't the victim that he'd once thought she would be. He could also tell that she had some interest in Carl, but that didn't take him very far.

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Beau slipped around, watching and waiting for Sadie's little interaction with Carl to be over. He had decided that he could wait patiently enough, knowing that the woman would eventually end whatever it was she was doing with the boy and wander unoccupied back toward headquarters looking for something new to occupy her time and attention. That was the moment that he was waiting for.

Finally, after some time, Carl had bounded off the porch of Sadie's house. Beau watched her a few minutes. She rocked back in the rocker that she was sitting in, and ran her fingers through her hair, tugging at her curls. She didn't look like she was going anywhere immediately, so Beau thought he might catch her attention there.

Sadie was a little surprised when Beau dropped over the side of her porch. He was always sneaking up on her, and she wondered if it was a matter of her not being able to hear him, or if he was in general just one of those people that seemed to magically appear when you weren't suspecting it at all.

"Hi," she said, smiling at him. Beau dropped into the seat next to her.

"Hi," he responded.

Sadie wondered for a moment if he wanted anything in particular, but he didn't offer any explanation at all for his presence.

"Slow day?" She asked, finally.

"There all slow when we ain't got that much ta do," Beau said.

"You need a hobby," Sadie offered.

"What you do when there ain't nothin' ta get done?" Beau asked.

Sadie thought about it a minute and shrugged. She had to admit that to her it seemed like there was _always_ something to do, if you wanted to do it. Granted, in the few days since the battle, the tasks were easier and less challenging, but there were still things to be done. Some people did them, others did what they wanted to do, but if you were bored you just had to find Carol or Daryl and you would immediately know _something_ that could use your attention.

"Don't know, I haven't run out of things to do," she replied.

Beau didn't respond to her immediately. He sat there, in the chair beside her, staring out at nothing. After a few minutes he turned and tapped her on the arm, his finger lingering there a second.

"What?" She asked.

"Nothin'," Beau said after a minute. "It's silly."

"What is it?" Sadie asked.

Beau seemed to consider her question for a minute. He seemed to be chewing it over.

"Well, I was wonderin' if I could ask ya for some advice," he started, "but it's about girls."

Sadie smiled, regarding him for a minute. Beau was a cute young man with a very gentle nature about him. Sadie liked him a lot. She didn't know much of his story, but she felt like he had travelled a long, and probably hard, road to get there. She could understand that. It made her feel a little sorry for him, since the blush of youth was still clearly to be found on the boy, despite the fact that he tried hard to hide it at times.

"What is it?" She asked.

"Well, I don't know much about 'em, but sayin' I was tryin' ta get the attention of one of 'em, how do you reckon I oughtta go about it?" He asked.

Sadie sat back, trying to figure out the best way to answer the boy. In the community she knew that both Chelsea and Stella were without anyone to call their own. She hated to admit that these days it seemed that all you needed to do to get the attention of someone else was to be single and interested, but that's about what it boiled down to. Both girls were lovely, and she could see where Beau, given his age and the calm that surrounded them these last few days, would be thinking about engaging in some sort of relationship with one or the other.

"Talk to her," Sadie offered.

"Yeah," Beau said, "but what am I gonna talk 'bout?"

Sadie smiled. Beau was chatty, she'd learned that much, but being chatty and understanding the art of conversation were two entirely different things.

"Try to find something that she's interested in," Sadie said. "Something that she likes. Talk about that. Ask her questions."

Beau smiled and nodded.

"You know, maybe you're right, now I just gotta figure out what she wants ta talk 'bout," Beau said.

"Who is it?" Sadie asked.

Beau regarded her for a moment.

"What?" He asked.

Sadie decided that he hadn't understood her well.

"Who is it? Chelsea or Stella?" She asked.

Beau blushed a little.

"Of the two," he said, "I reckon I like Stella more. She ain't been the same since Dominique died, but she's a smiley kinda gal an' I like the smiley kind."

Sadie smiled at him.

"Talk to her, see if you can get her chatting. Don't push it too much, though," she said.

"What'cha mean?" Beau asked.

"Take your time," Sadie explained. "Too much, too fast can push girls away. Don't get in a hurry."

Beau smiled back at Sadie, thanked her, and vaulted over the side of the porch the way that he'd come, ignoring completely that they had steps. Sadie smiled after him as he trotted away.

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Daryl was in a great mood. He'd gotten a deer, and a nice one. Carol had cooked up a real fine dinner for everyone, and he was in the mood to celebrate, at least to a degree. He'd slipped off to the storage house, not explaining himself to anyone, and had invited Sadie and Mark to join them for a little after hours fun at his house. No one had questioned him, though Michonne and Carol both had shot him questioning looks.

"Drink up," Daryl said, refilling Carol's glass. Everyone but Michonne was drinking, and Daryl worried from time to time that she wouldn't be happy with that, but she seemed more than amused. She'd gladly put all the babies to bed, offering Sadie the option of letting Paul sleep in the bassinet that they'd wrangled up for when she was occupying the bedroom floors upstairs.

Carol took the glass, too far gone to refuse the refill offered to her entirely.

"I think," she stammered, "that you're just trying to get me drunk. I think you're just trying to take advantage of me."

Carol was sitting between Tyreese's legs, leaned against him, and he was using a chair for support. Daryl, Michonne, and Sadie were occupying the couch, and Mark had laid claim to the other chair.

"I promise I won't take advantage of you," Tyreese said, tipping Carol's face towards his for a moment, "unless you ask me to." He planted a kiss on her lips for a second.

Carol laughed at him and snuggled back into him. Daryl smiled and refilled the other glasses around him.

"So, Sadie," Michonne said, enjoying very much the loose tongued friends she had around her, "how are things with Beau?"

Mark tapped Sadie and she drew to attention.

"What?" She asked.

"How are things with Beau?" Michonne asked again. Sadie looked confused for a second.

"He likes you," Mark said after drawing her attention.

"No, he likes Stella," Sadie said, obviously almost too far gone to continue any sort of conversation.

"No," Michonne said, waving her hand and drawing Sadie back to her. "He likes you and you just don't know it."

Sadie laughed. Her laugh was apparently contagious because Carol caught it and Tyreese put his hand up to steady her glass.

"Beau likes Sadie, and Rick likes Sadie," Carol said, swaying the glass that Tyreese was trying to hold steady. "Everyone likes Sadie and Sadie doesn't know it!"

Sadie turned to Mark and he did his best to slow things down and interpret the slurred words of Carol.

"No," she protested. "He likes Stella. He told me," Sadie said.

Everyone laughed at that.

"He's a baby," Sadie protested.

"Not really," Mark said. "He's cute, and he's well over age. I would say Beau is stalking his cougar right now." He made sure that Sadie caught his words. She blushed.

"Stop! No he isn't!" She protested.

A few minutes of drinking later, and a few filled glasses, and Sadie finally piped up again, catching everyone's attention.

"And?" She asked. "If he is? Does it matter?"

Everyone agreed that it really didn't. Michonne sat back in the couch, hugging her legs up onto the cushion and smiling at those around her. It didn't matter. Nothing like that which would once have been scandalous seemed to matter anymore. She was only amused by knowing that Rick was also interested in the woman who was, at this moment, drunk enough to look like she would soon be offering her a pillow.

"No, Sadie, it doesn't matter," Mark offered, making sure she was looking at him. She smiled at him. "We get it where we can, am I right?" He asked, offering up his glass as though he were making a toast and then drinking down the contents.

Everyone laughed, and a few downed their drinks. Daryl, being the host that he was, quickly refilled them.

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When the evening was through, Michonne had ushered Daryl upstairs. He'd been too far gone to notice her even undressing him and putting him to bed. She'd come out of the bedroom to find Tyreese attempting to get an only half conscious Carol up the stairs.

"Do you need help?" Michonne asked, noticing that he was struggling a little just because of her general unresponsive nature.

"No," Tyreese said. "We'll be fine. She just thinks she's more mobile than she is," he offered. "If it takes too much longer I'm picking her up. She doesn't weigh more than a decent bag of potatoes."

Michonne smiled and slipped past them, letting the couple battle it out on the stairs. Carol was as drunk as she'd ever seen her, and probably more drunk than she'd ever been in her life. Though Tyreese had consumed a few drinks, he seemed the most level headed of the group next to Michonne. She knew they'd be fine, but they had to do things their way.

Downstairs Michonne tucked in Mark, who had made a bed from nothing on the floor. She brought him a blanket and a pillow and he responded best to the pillow, thanking her as though she'd given him the greatest gift known to man. He buried his face in it and she covered him, smoothing his hair absentmindedly with her hand.

She offered Sadie a pillow as well, and found her unresponsive. She'd gently lifted her head, putting the pillow beneath her as she lie on the couch, leaving Mark the floor, and then she'd covered her with the blanket.

Finally Michonne had made her way to bed, thinking that everyone would be fine until morning, and then they'd really regret the night they'd shared. She undressed in the room and slipped into bed. Daryl, in an almost unconscious state, made a few grabs at her, insisting in some slurred words that he could do something for her, but she'd kissed him and dismissed him, knowing that his concerns only stemmed from his earlier worries that she'd been mad she hadn't been able to drink anything.

"Go to sleep, baby," Michonne said, rolling over and running her hands through Daryl's hair. "It's all good, I promise."

Daryl mumbled something in response that was unintelligible.

"I love you," Michonne said, rolling over and snuggling against him. "Sleep well and know I love you. It's all OK, Daryl."

When he mumbled again she smiled to herself in the darkness. She couldn't understand his words, but she knew him well enough to know he was still probably apologizing for something.

"It's OK, baby, it's all OK. I promise, no matter what," she said, hoping he'd drift off soon and stop mumbling. She reached around her and found his arm. She pulled it around her and snuggled back into his body. "I promise, it's all OK," she said, one last time. He was quiet afterwards and she drifted off to sleep, promising herself that she'd wake up early enough to keep everyone from wondering why Carol hadn't been there to get breakfast started.


	80. Chapter 80

Michonne was busy cooking when Beth came up.

"Where's Carol?" Beth asked, yawning and rubbing her eyes sleepily.

"Carol is taking the day off," Michonne said.

"What?" Beth asked. Michonne snickered a little because Beth sounded so surprised.

"She's taking a break," Michonne answered again. She moved around the meat in the pan she was cooking with. "Can you go get some more meat out of that smokehouse?" She asked, pointing. "And stir the oatmeal as you go," she added.

Beth didn't respond, but she did go to work. Michonne's stomach rumbled. She realized her morning sickness had finally gone on vacation because instead of the smell of the meat making her want to run for it, she realized it made her feel like she was starving. She was making extra because right now she felt like she could eat the pan in front of her without sharing with anyone else.

Tyreese was the next to join her, coming over with Judith toddling beside him, clinging to one of his fingers, her fingers in her mouth, and the baby tucked in the other arm.

"Aren't you missing someone?" Michonne asked, barely glancing at him.

"Who do you mean? Hope or the house full of Walkers that I just left?" Tyreese responded.

Michonne snickered.

"Hope. I didn't have much confidence that the rest of the crew would be accounted for this early," she said.

"I put Hope in the bed with Daryl to terrorize him a bit. She's in a really good mood and was pretty snuggly. I thought he might want to enjoy that for a bit while he's waking up," Tyreese said. "I think Carol is dead, Sadie is acting a little homicidal, and Mark was in the fetal position when I left. Do you need any help?"

"No," Michonne responded, reaching out to take the meat from Beth who had just returned. "I think we've got it covered here. If you can just rouse the household, you'll have done a lot."

"I'd rather cook breakfast," Tyreese said. "Can you take these two?"

Michonne sighed and reached up to take the baby from him, which he placed in her arms. She supposed that she could cook one handed, she'd seen Carol do it countless times.

"Don't go anywhere, Jude," Michonne warned the child. Judith ignored her and started to follow Tyreese back toward the house. "Judith! Back here!"

Judith stopped trotting behind Tyreese, turned, and finally took her fingers out of her mouth.

"I go with dada," she said, pointing toward Tyreese who was continuing on.

"No, you stay with me. He'll be back," Michonne argued.

Judith made a face at her.

"You can make that face all you want," Michonne said, "but do it over here where I can see you better."

Reluctantly the girl came back in the area where she was allowed to play, choosing one of her abandoned yard toys for entertainment. She knew by now that if she didn't listen when they told her to stay there, she'd be put in the pen, and then she really had no hope of trotting off behind anyone that she wanted to follow around.

Beth helped Michonne get the breakfast ready and get it inside. Michonne had paid very little attention to everyone trickling in, mostly owing to the fact that it was quite a bit of work to get breakfast ready, keep an eye on Judith, and dole out portions for everyone. Michonne frowned as she started putting portions on all the plates.

_The size of this family is ridiculous_, she thought. She'd never intended in her life to have a very large family, and for a moment she felt like she was a mother to about thirty people. She'd finally put the baby in one of the baby seats that were strung around. The good thing about Carol was that she had thought ahead and had established "baby areas" in nearly every location where she often stuck juggling children and chores.

The chatter told Michonne that the dining room was full. Beth started taking plates.

"You need to ring the bell to call up the rest," Beth said, her hands full of plates.

"Oh, yeah," Michonne said, heading out and ringing the bell. Coming toward her was Rachel.

"Helping with breakfast?" Rachel asked.

"Something like that," Michonne responded.

"I'm going to take a plate down to Seth and one down to Maggie," Rachel said. "I think they'll both be well enough to come to dinner tonight, but I won't push them to be up this early. Is Carol in the kitchen?"

Michonne started to walk back into the house with Rachel.

"She's taking the day off," Michonne explained. It was the second time she had to explain it, but somehow she felt like it was something she'd be saying a lot during the day.

Rachel wrinkled her forehead.

"Is she sick?" Rachel asked.

"No, just on vacation. I'm filling in for the day," Michonne said.

"Oh," Rachel responded. "Well, I'll take their breakfast. I'm going to need to change bandages for both of them, do you think you can get that stuff together for me? I'm going to eat down there with Seth, but I can pick everything up after breakfast."

"Um, sure," Michonne said. "I can do that."

They both pushed into the kitchen then and Rachel gathered up plates, balancing them precariously in her arms.

"Are you sure you've got that?" Michonne asked, waiting for all three plates to come crashing to the floor.

"You know, I probably don't," Rachel admitted. She returned one of the plates. "I'll take mine and Seth's, if you can run that down to Maggie, that would be great," she said. "Just tell her that I'll be down there after I eat to check on her."

Michonne stood there a minute, and Rachel walked out of the room.

"Sure, I got it, no problem," Michonne mumbled. She turned, almost bumping into Beth who was trekking back and forth taking plates to the dining room.

"I hungry!" Judith called to Michonne, pulling at her pants.

"Hold on, Jude, I'm working on it," Michonne said. She picked up one of the small plates and one of full larger ones. She made her way to the dining room, aware that Judith was trailing her. "Tyreese, please," she said, holding up the small plate so that he would see what she was getting at. She put it on of the high chairs and picked Judith up, putting her in the seat. Tyreese got up and moved closer to the chair.

Carol was at the table, but nothing about her indicated that she was even happy to be alive at the moment. Sadie looked pretty rough too. She was sitting on the floor, leaning against the wall. Beau was attempting to convince her to eat something. Mark was nursing his own hangover. Michonne scanned the room a second. Daryl looked hungover, but was better at dealing with it than the others. He was eating and feeding Hope who was sitting in his lap, grabbing at the food.

"Beau, make sure Sadie eats something, she's got to feed that baby soon," Michonne called.

Michonne turned and headed back to the kitchen. She picked up one of the plates that was left and started out the door toward Maggie and Glenn's house.

Michonne had not seen Maggie since the night of the battle. She didn't knock, just let herself into the house, knowing that Maggie was there alone. She made her way through the house and up the stairs, stopping to knock on the door to Glenn and Maggie's room.

"Come in," Maggie called.

Michonne opened the door and came in, Maggie was sitting up awkwardly in bed. Her shoulder was bandaged and tied to her.

"How are you feeling?" Michonne asked.

"Better," Maggie said, smiling. She looked tired, but there was color in her face. "I thought you'd be Rachel, or Carol."

"Sorry to disappoint," Michonne said. "Rachel is with Seth and Carol is taking the day off."

Michonne put the plate of food in Maggie's lap.

"Carol is taking the day off?" Maggie asked.

Michonne smiled. "Yeah, she's taking the day off," she responded. "Are you good? Do you need anything else? Rachel is coming by to take care of you after breakfast."

"I'm fine," Maggie said. "I could use some more water, though, and do you think I could get a bath today? I'm starting to smell myself."

Michonne nodded. "Sure, I'll get you some water and I'll make sure some bath water is warmed up for Rachel."

"Thanks," Maggie said.

"No problem, I'm heading back for a bit," Michonne said. She got up and started back toward headquarters. Her stomach was growling now, and she hoped that Hope wasn't too full because if she was she was going to have to pump soon. She'd decided that Glenn or Beth could take Maggie water. She'd scarf down what she could and get water going to wash dishes and to offer Rachel water to take to Maggie.

Michonne sighed, she had the feeling this was going to be a very long day.

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Beau followed Sadie down the street toward her house. She had retrieved the baby she kept with her from Michonne, and now she was wandering home. He didn't know if she was aware that he was behind her. She hadn't seemed too on top of things at all this morning. He had a good idea of what had taken place at their house the night before, and most of them seemed a little out of it.

Sadie mounted the porch steps and dropped into one of the rocking chairs, the baby cradled in her arms. Beau stopped and watched her for a minute. She tipped her head back and put her feet on the railing of the porch.

He wondered if she was planning on going to sleep right there. He watched her a minute, trying to decide if he should go up and talk to her like he planned or if he should just go on about his business. She suddenly kicked up from her position, got out of the chair and disappeared into the house, only to reappear a second later with a baby carrier, which she put by the chair she had been occupying and gently placed the baby in. Beau walked up then, bounding up the porch steps. Sadie looked at him a second, smiled, and then sat back in the rocking chair. Beau leaned against the railing in front of her, stripping her of her earlier foot rest, and rocked the chair with his foot on the front of the rocker.

"Y'all musta had fun last night," he said. She looked better now than she did at breakfast. When she'd first sat down to eat Beau had thought there was something seriously wrong with her, and then the others had trickled in and he realized they were all nursing some kind of epic hangover.

Sadie smiled at him.

"We did, but today, it's not so much fun," she said.

"Never is," Beau said. He'd gotten drunk with his brothers a few times. They knew a man that lived not far from them that made some pretty low quality moonshine, but it did the trick. He remembered a few nights hiding out from his ma with that mason jar. The next day they'd all have to try to hide their hangovers, but his uncle always seemed to call them on it. He'd work them extra hard on those days, making them pay for their transgressions, but at least he never let Beau's mama know what they'd been doing. They'd grin and bear any punishment he doled out, so long as she didn't catch wind of what happened.

"You're too young to drink," Sadie said, giving him a disapproving look.

"No I'm not," Beau answered back, rocking the chair particularly hard to jar her a little. "I ain't been too young to drink for a while."

Beau wasn't too young to drink. He'd been old enough to celebrate his twenty first birthday at the local bar and honky tonk with his uncle and some of his rambunctious friends. He'd even gotten the attention of a couple of the girls there, though he hadn't done anything about it.

"How old are you, Beau?" Sadie asked. She leaned her arm up against the back of the chair, resting her head against her palm.

"I ain't got a clue," Beau said. It wasn't a lie. He really didn't have any idea how old he was anymore. The truth was that he hadn't kept track of time since all this started happening. Some days he felt like it had only been a matter of months since he'd come to realize the threat that was all around him, and other days it seemed like he'd been out there, away from the place he'd called home his entire life, for almost as long as he'd been home. "How old are you?"

Sadie snickered at him.

"A lady never reveals her age," she said, smiling. Beau returned the smile.

"Then I reckon we're even," Beau said. He paused a moment longer, leaned against the railing and continued to rock the chair. Sadie stared intently back at him, but didn't say anything, nor did she protest the rocking. Finally, Beau dropped his gaze, breaking the line of sight between them and gave the rocker a final kick. "I'm gonna go down an' see if'n they need help findin' some stuff for dinner in the fields," he said, tipping his face back toward Sadie enough that he knew she'd be able to understand him. "You oughta drink some water," he added after a second. "I'll bring ya some on my way ta go down there." Beau didn't wait for a response. He threw his leg over the railing he'd been leaning against and dropped to the ground, heading toward headquarters.

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Michonne was exhausted by dinner. She grumpily served plates of food, irritated for a moment that hardly anyone said thank you when they received their plates, nor did they seem to think it might be a good idea to pass through the kitchen themselves and request their dinner.

Rachel had brought Seth and Maggie down to headquarters to join everyone else for the first time since the battle. Michonne had served all three of them first, and then she'd taken to serving the others with the quiet assistance of Beth.

When she finally took her seat, most everyone else was done eating and more than a few of the faces looked like they weren't far from desiring some sleep.

"So how'd you end up with them anyway?" Rick asked Seth. Michonne had come in on the tail of whatever conversation they'd been having, but it didn't take her long to figure out that they'd been talking about the group that they had "overcome", as they'd chosen to label what had taken place.

"I was with another group," Seth said. "We ran up on the group, I guess you could say. There was a bit of conflict. I guess I was a coward, I didn't want to get killed, so I agreed to join their group." He lowered his eyes then, focusing on his food.

"That doesn't make you a coward," Rachel said. She was sitting beside him and reached out, resting a hand on his arm. "We all do what we think is right to stay alive these days." She remembered that she had been one of the many that had blindly followed the Governor right up until the end, even believing the threat he had talked about when preparing to take on the enemy group of the prison. Now they were her group, these days things changed rapidly at times.

"The woman that was with ya, the one Sadie said you was locked up with, was she your wife?" Daryl asked.

"No," Seth responded, looking up now. "I didn't know her. She was a woman that came from another group. She got traded in."

"What the hell's all this tradin' shit you keep talkin' 'bout?" Daryl asked. He'd heard the word tossed around a few times and it didn't make any sense to him. You could trade a lot of things, but he had yet to figure out how or why you'd want to trade your group members.

"This group," Seth offered, "did a lot of trading. Women and children mostly. If another group had a woman that someone liked enough, they'd set up a trade, swap out another woman that they had, if she was pretty enough, or two or three if they weren't that nice. Children were often thrown in, since they really weren't good to have around unless you could guarantee that they'd make it to be good for labor. I saw a few of the trade negotiations."

"Man, that's fucked up," Daryl said. "Who the hell thinks they can just go tradin' people like they was money or some shit like that."

"It's not exactly a new idea," Michonne offered. Daryl looked at her. "Seems like one group of people or another have thought that they had that right for ages. We've just gotten back around to it now as a society," she said.

Daryl chewed at the skin on his thumb.

"Still fucked up," he growled.

"That it is," Michonne said.

"I didn't think it was a good practice," Seth said, "don't get me wrong, but that's what they were doing. That's how we got Sam in the group."

"Who was Sam?" Rick asked.

"Sam was the woman, Samantha, that I was locked up with. We tried to get away one night when we had watch. They caught us and locked us up. They were planning on trading her and those other three women as soon as they found something worth trading for," Seth explained.

"What happened to the others?" Mark asked, finally. There had been a lot more people lost in their group than could be accounted for at this time and he was curious.

"Some died, some were traded," Seth offered. "There were some kids there, a couple got traded, but the others died. The group didn't bother to take very good care of the people that they were holding just to use in trades. They just had to keep them healthy enough to be appealing in the case of a negotiation."

"And everybody in that damn group was OK with all that shit?" Daryl asked. He couldn't imagine for a minute what would happen in their group if anyone had come up with the idea to _trade_ someone out for another person. All hell would break loose and they'd probably decide that the person who suggested it had gone completely off the deep end and needed to be restrained.

Seth shrugged. "I don't know, I honestly don't. It was hard to tell how much people did because they wanted to do it, and how much they did out of fear. Things didn't work there quite like they do here."

"Well that's pretty obvious," Glenn said. He was wide eyed listening to the conversation that was unfolding around him. "What about the other groups? These groups that they traded with? Were they staying in the area or just passing through?"

Seth shrugged again. "I don't know. None of them ever really said anything about their situations. That wasn't how it worked."

"Well, I hope they just moved on," Tyreese offered. "I, for one, could use a break from dealing with outsiders." He stopped for a minute and took a bite of food. "No offense," he said after a pause.

Seth grunted to signal that he'd felt no offense at the comment.

"It's fine, I know, I'm an outsider. I'm not like them, though, and I'll pull my weight," he said.

"We were all outsiders once," Rachel said.

Tyreese nodded at her comment, not adding anything to it.

"Well, I can tell ya one thing," Daryl said. "If they still 'round here we ain't goin' out lookin' for 'em no time soon. Long as they don't bother us, we'll stay the hell away from 'em."

"I agree," Rick said. "We need a break from it all. We need time to recover from that last group."

Daryl thought that laying low sounded like a good idea to him. He had no desire to get involved with any other groups again if it could be avoided. They could all use a little down time, some time to just enjoy everything they had. As long as there was no one threatening to take that away from them, he was willing to let whoever wanted to pass through the area do so peacefully. They wouldn't meet any resistance unless they came calling and tried to create problems. Then, of course, they'd respond, but they weren't going looking for conflict.

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Michonne was exhausted, so Daryl offered to put Hope to bed. As soon as the little girl was calm and lying in her crib, looking like she'd be asleep soon, he slipped into the bedroom.

"You 'sleep yet?" He asked. The lamp was still lit, but Michonne was lying on her side with her back to the door, so he couldn't tell.

"Not really," she said. He walked around the bed and crawled under the covers.

"Hope's down," he said, putting his face close to hers. "You tired?" He asked.

"Yeah, Daryl, I am," Michonne said. Her eyes were closed. Daryl leaned over and let his lips graze over her eyelids gently.

"Had a tough day today?" He asked.

Michonne smiled but didn't open her eyes.

"I did. I learned that I don't want to be Carol when I grow up," she said.

Daryl snickered.

He got up and pulled the cover off of Michonne. She groaned but didn't move.

"Daryl, I'm tired," she protested.

"I know that, you done said it once," Daryl said, crawling down the bed.

"Can I have the blanket back then?" Michonne asked.

"In a bit," Daryl said. "Damn, 'Chonne, why don't you put your grumpy mood to bed for a bit?"

Michonne sat up then, leaning on her elbow, "I'm not trying to be grumpy, Daryl, I'm just tired and I don't want to do anything."

Daryl took a seat at the foot of the bed.

"So don't do nothin', 'Chonne. I ain't asked ya ta do nothin'," He replied. He grabbed her leg and brought her foot into his lap, kneading it in his hands.

"Ohhh…" Michonne said, dropping back and rolling over onto her back, offering him the other foot as well.

Daryl snickered.

"See, an' you was gettin' all ill with me," Daryl said.

"Oh, God, that feels so good," Michonne responded.

Daryl snickered again.

"You better stop sayin' all that, 'Chonne, or everyone in the house is gonna think you was in the mood for somethin'," Daryl said. "You reckon you might get a little vacation from bein' Carol tomorrow, and then you might be more in the mood to spend some time with me?"

Michonne moaned in response.

"If you keep doing that, I'll do whatever you want," Michonne said.

Daryl smiled and continued to knead her feet, enjoying the fact that he could elicit such moans from her even without attempting to please her sexually.

"You gotta deal, 'Chonne, but I'm holdin' ya to it." Daryl said.


	81. Chapter 81

**AN: This one is short, and I'm sorry for that. We are in "fluff" mode for a bit, so for those of you who don't like it, I apologize. **

**I intend to write more, but I did make this a pretty short chapter/snippet. Basically I've been planning for a while, and I have a lot coming up, but I'm working through a little writer's block/lessened desire to write than I had before. I figured something was better than nothing and the little movements along keep me going. **

**Even though it's short and unsatisfying, I hope you like it. I'll try to get some more out soon. I promise we're nowhere near done yet, I just have to keep pushing to get it all out. I hope you're all still with me.**

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Daryl and Beau were working on tearing down another house, but they were making slow progress. Daryl didn't mind that it was slow. It gave them work to do, but it didn't feel like it was urgent. Right now it didn't feel like anything was urgent and he liked it that way. It had been almost two weeks since their last brush with danger, when the battle had taken place, and things were just quiet around the community. It was a quiet that was much appreciated by all. In fact, Daryl thought from time to time, that if he didn't know any better, and he ignored the Walkers that gathered around the fences from time to time, he could almost believe that things were back the way they were before all this happened. Sure, they didn't have electricity, and they lacked running water, but those things didn't seem important anymore. They had plenty of what was important right now.

Beau hacked at some of the framework for the room they were tearing down. He was quieter than he normally was, and Daryl had a good idea that he knew why.

"You goin' through somethin' there, Beau?" Daryl asked after a bit of listening to the boys sighs alternating with the sound of his axe making contact with wood.

Beau sighed loudly again. Tyreese came into the room, having left briefly to go for water, and picked up another axe to start working. Beau eyed him a little.

"Did I interrupt something?" Tyreese asked, looking at Daryl and pausing in the swing that he was about to take.

"Nah, I was just tryin' ta figure out what's got ole Beau here frustrated, but he ain't said nothin'," Daryl said, going back to what he was doing.

After a moment of working, Beau finally decided that he would speak to Daryl and Tyreese, knowing well enough that anything he said to either one of them was likely to become common knowledge since everyone had long since figured out that everything was shared in that household.

"If I was tryin' ta get a girl to know I liked her, what would be the best way ta handle it?" Beau asked finally.

Daryl and Tyreese both stopped what they were doing and looked at each other for a moment. Tyreese chuckled.

"Man, is that _girl_ you talkin' 'bout Sadie?" Daryl asked. "'Cause she ain't no girl, and she already knows ya like her. Hell, _everyone_ knows ya like her. You been hangin' 'round her like she was in heat for the past two weeks."

Beau looked at both of the men in front of him, trying to decide if there was judgment there or not. He decided that he didn't think there was.

"If she knows I like her why ain't she said somethin'?" Beau asked.

"What do you want her to say?" Tyreese asked. All three of them had suddenly become far more interested in this conversation than they had in any halfhearted attempt to tear out this room.

"I dunno," Beau said. "Somethin'…I've never done this before."

"You mean…" Tyreese started. He didn't finish, but he shot a look to Daryl. Daryl bit at his thumb. Beau looked embarrassed and Daryl felt a little sorry for him. Prior to Michonne he certainly didn't have a laundry list of conquests.

"Maybe he's a late bloomer," Daryl said. "Listen, Beau, just 'cause you ain't done it yet don't mean you won't do it a whole lot when ya got ya a woman of your own, but take my advice an' pick ya one of these girl pups we got runnin' around to play with. Let Sadie alone."

"Let's just say I was thinkin' 'bout Stella," Beau said. "How d'ya get Michonne ta pay attention to ya?" Beau asked, deciding to ignore Daryl's warning against pursuing Sadie.

"Just tell her ya like her, tell her she's pretty or some shit like that," Daryl said. "She'll like that. Give her a kiss when ya feel man enough to do it."

Tyreese chuckled again.

"Daryl, man, you said Michonne kissed you, why are you telling this boy to just kiss a girl if he hasn't done it before? Would _you_ have walked up to Michonne and told her she was pretty?" Tyreese asked.

"Well then how did you get Carol's attention?" Beau asked. If Michonne kissed Daryl first, that wasn't the way he was going, and he wasn't sure he had the guts to just walk right up to Sadie and tell her that he thought she was the most beautiful woman that he'd ever seen.

Tyreese chuckled again.

"I approached her nice and easy, kept a soft voice, and made no sudden movements," Tyreese said.

"Sounds more like you was comin' up on some kinda wounded animal," Daryl said.

Tyreese cocked an eyebrow at him.

"I hate to say it, but it's the same idea," he admitted.

Daryl nodded his head a little in understanding.

Beau just looked between them. This was great. He had no more information now than when he'd started this line of questioning. Sadie wasn't going to just kiss him, if she were she'd had ample opportunity by now, he wasn't sure he could muster up enough courage to just kiss her, and he wasn't certain she'd be impressed if he did. She wasn't a wounded animal either.

"Forget it," Beau said. He turned back to working.

"Hey," Daryl said, "you'll figure it out, but don't go tryin' to tree Sadie. Pick another one. Sadie ain't right for ya."

Beau scoffed. He didn't verbally disagree with Daryl, but he decided to ignore him. He hadn't exactly heard anyone else telling someone who they should and shouldn't get involved with, and he didn't appreciate Daryl's decision to give him advice now.

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Michonne had always laughed at Daryl when he called her a predator. It was his way of saying that she had asked for them to have sex instead of him, but right now she actually_ felt_ predatory. She'd been waiting all day to get him alone, and now that they were finally alone, he couldn't stop laughing at her.

"You plannin' on rapin' me, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked. He had seen Michonne like this before, but maybe not quite this bad. She was sitting on the bed and he was circling around her in the room, watching her grow more and more frustrated.

"Daryl, get over here," Michonne said.

Daryl was always in the mood, so she wasn't buying that he wasn't in the mood for even a minute. She could tell that he was turned on, even with just the lamplight and even from this distance. He was toying with her, though, and she knew that too.

Daryl laughed.

"I don't know woman, I come up here tryin' ta have a civilized conversation with ya an' you done took off 'bout half your clothes 'fore I could even get the door closed," Daryl said.

"Daryl," Michonne said.

"Calm down, woman, I'ma give ya what ya want," he said, smiling. "I just think you oughta ask me for it, nicely."

Michonne huffed. He was enjoying this way too much, but at this point she'd do whatever it was that he wanted just to get him to come to bed.

"Fine, _please_ come over here, Daryl," Michonne said.

Daryl smiled, that crooked smile that meant that he was up to something. Michonne shot him a look intending to tell him that she was only willing to play his game for so long, but she was sure something got lost in the translation.

"Hold on, now," Daryl said. "I don't think that was nice enough. I done a lotta work today an' now you're wantin' me to go an' do more an' you can't even ask nicer than that?"

Michonne glared at him.

"Daryl, would you please stop being an _ass_ and come to bed?" Michonne asked.

"Really, 'Chonne?" Daryl askied, grinning now. "That's s'posed ta make me wanna come over there? Why don't ya do somethin' nice for me?"

"What do you want, Daryl?" Michonne asked.

"How 'bout ya put on somethin' pretty for me?" He said. He took his shirt off, dropping it on the floor and stood there with his hand cocked up on his hip.

Michonne couldn't help but smile at him.

"What do you want me to put on?" She asked.

"How 'bout that lacy thing you got?" Daryl asked.

"Doesn't fit, Daryl. In case you haven't noticed, I've put on a few pounds, here and there," Michonne said.

"You gotta bunch 'a stuff, 'Chonne, you tellin' me you ain't got nothin' pretty that'll fit?" Daryl asked.

Michonne sighed. She got up and finished stripping off what was left of her clothes, aware that Daryl was watching her. She went to the dresser and started digging around, hoping to find something that would interest him. She'd wear a plastic bag right now if it would bring him to bed.

"What do you want, Daryl? I don't have much to go on," Michonne said.

"You got somethin' yellow?" Daryl asked.

"Something yellow?" Michonne asked. She tried to act out whatever fantasies her husband had, but Daryl could be odd at times.

"Somethin' like that dress you was wearin' in my picture book," Daryl said.

Michonne thought a minute. She knew the dress. The picture he was referring to was his favorite one of the entire photo album that he flipped through lazily from time to time. She had actually loved that dress, and apparently so had he.

"No, Daryl, I don't have a dress like that," Michonne said. "I do have a shirt that's about the same color, will that do?"

Daryl shrugged. "Don't need pants no way, 'Chonne, not for what we're doin'."

Michonne smiled at him. Daryl was indeed a man of reason.

"If I put it on will you please come to bed?" Michonne asked.

He smiled.

"I'll come to bed, 'Chonne, an' I'll take care of whatever you got goin' on there," Daryl said. "I don't want no woman of mine sayin' I didn't take care of her needs."

Michonne dug through the drawer and pulled on the buttercup yellow shirt that she had in mind, feeling ridiculous. Daryl smiled at her, though, and suddenly she didn't feel nearly as ridiculous as she had moments before.

"You sure is pretty, 'Chonne," Dary said.

Michonne smiled at him. Sometimes she wondered what this life had done to them. Sometimes, like after the battle, she thought they were all cold. They could kill, and they had killed. Sometimes, when they buried someone they loved, she thought they were all detached. They'd come to accept the fact that at a moment's notice they lost the people they cared about. Sometime she thought that they'd become only shadows of who they once had been. Sometimes this life seemed cruel, almost unlivable.

Then other times there was something so _good_ about life, like right this moment. She felt even _guilty_ about how she felt right now. She had a comfortable bed that she was about to crawl into, a beautiful daughter. She could feel her baby squirming inside her, awakened apparently by her sudden movement from the bed, and the husband she could never imagine before all of this approaching her now with a smile on his face over her agreeing to just put on a _shirt_. It wasn't even that flattering, just a buttercup yellow shirt…but life had taught them that everything they had was something they had to value, even if it was just the beauty they found in a buttercup yellow shirt.

Daryl came over to Michonne, kissing her hard, his hands holding her shoulders. His mind already thinking about what would come next. Michonne gave herself over to him, letting him take control now. She knew that the game was over, and she'd won this round.


	82. Chapter 82

It was hot, hotter than usual for the time of year. They had all expected the heat, but they weren't sure if there wasn't some sort of heat wave going on. It felt like the dog days and unless they'd lost track of time entirely it was far too early for that.

Michonne was thankful for once that she wasn't more pregnant than she already was, and she was also glad that they'd all agreed to take it a little easy until some of the heat lifted. They were sticking to just taking care of what had to be done, and the rest of the time they dedicated to trying not to puddle to death.

Mostly they stayed outside simply because it was cooler outside than it was in their houses. They went in to sleep, but the hope of a breeze outside was greater than the hope of one drifting through the windows, which were all raised. Right now they were missing air conditioning, ice, and even things as simple as the cool weather that they'd been happy to see go.

Michonne was currently occupying one of the lawn chairs that they'd rounded up and sitting in front of headquarters with Carol and Mark. Judith and Hope were playing in the yard, and Michonne had lost track of Daryl sometime earlier. He'd been in the back playing with his rabbits, as she liked to think of it. It his plan had been successful, and the rabbits were indeed beginning to multiply. They were at least going to have plenty of rabbit meat, and he was serious about getting as many as possible. She and Carol had often joked that he and Tyreese sat back there and sang love songs to the long eared creatures trying to inspire them to mate.

"I can remember my grandmother," Carol said while they were sitting there, "and she'd sit around on her old porch with this old woman that was her neighbor, and they'd just sit and rock and talk about how hot it was all summer long. I wondered why anyone would spend their time doing that, and look at us now." She paused. Michonne smiled at her. "I'm my grandmother!"

"I know what you mean," Michonne said. "I can also remember all those annoying conversations about needing the rain. When I was growing up, no matter what, if I complained about the rain my father would always say 'we need the rain,' and I could never figure out why it was all that important." She sighed, stretching her back. "Now we need the rain for the crops, I understand it."

"Are we turning into old ladies, Michonne?" Carol asked.

"Why do I get left out of this?" Mark teased. "I've said at least a dozen phrases I never thought I'd utter since all this started."

"Do you want to be an old lady with us, Mark?" Carol asked.

Michonne snorted.

"No, I'm not old enough for it just yet," Mark said.

"We'd all jump at the chance to be old these days," Michonne said.

"Depends on the day and I feel like I'm not that far away from it," Carol said.

"Girl, you need a new attitude about that," Mark said. "If you tell yourself you're old, you'll feel old, it just works that way. It's the power of the mind. Tell yourself you are what you want to be, and you'll be it."

Carol laughed.

"Self-help at the end of the world, book on tape, recited by Mark," she said.

Michonne snickered.

"Keep laughing, smart ass," Mark said, tipping his head back on his chair. "The first thing you could use is a makeover."

"You told me you owned a furniture store and that you were a volunteer EMT, were you also a stylist or something?" Carol asked smirking at him.

Mark rolled his head toward her.

"I'm a gay man, and no self-respecting gay man isn't at least a little bit of a stylist. Besides, anyone could tell you that your little orphan Annie hairstyle could use some work," Mark said.

Carol scoffed. If she'd had anything to throw at him, she would have.

"I don't think I've hardly even looked at my hair in ages," Carol said.

"And it looks like it," Mark commented.

Michonne sat back, smiling at the two of them bantering back and forth. She wondered how long this would go on. They had all day, there wasn't much else happening. It was free entertainment for her.

"I don't know about you, Mark, but my blow dryer hasn't been working lately. Someone forgot to pay the electricity bill at our house, power's been out since we moved in," Carol countered.

"I admit," Mark said, "that you've got hair like Sadie's and therefore it's somewhat unmanageable, but I could make it better, or at least try to, if you're interested, and if you were nice to me."

Carol cocked an eyebrow at him. "Nice to you? What do you want? A foot massage and a strawberry daiquiri?"

Mark looked like he was considering it a moment. "The daiquiri feels nice. I really don't like people touching my feet, though."

Michonne laughed and both of them looked at her. She tried to get it under control.

"If you want to do something to my hair, Mark, I don't care, but I've lived with it all my life. I know it's a mess," Carol said.

"Do you have scissors?" Mark asked.

"In headquarters," Carol answered.

"I can look at your household and tell there's not a brush or a comb to be found," Mark said. "I'll go get mine. You ladies stay put."

Mark got up from his chair and started toward his house. Carol and Michonne looked at each other. Both of them were smiling, and both were curious to see what Mark was up to.

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Mark came and went without explanation and Sadie watched him from the porch as he headed back down to headquarters. Mark liked conversation, and Sadie didn't blame him for that. She had liked conversation too, when it was a lot easier for her to chat with others without having to be focused on them at all times.

She saw Beau approaching, wood clasped in one hand and knife in the other, but his walk was calm, so she knew there was no problem. He was just coming to visit, and he visited often. She smiled when he came around and mounted the porch steps instead of climbing over the railing like she'd asked him to do.

He sat in the chair next to her without a word and went to work at what he was doing. Sadie fanned herself and regarded him. He was carving something, she could see that clearly now, but it wasn't anywhere near finished. She brushed his arm and he looked at her.

"What are you making?" She asked.

Beau looked at the piece of wood in his hand for a second as though he'd never seen it before. He shrugged slightly.

"An angel," he said, looking at Sadie. He showed her what he had done so far. "I made one, he explained for Dominique's grave. Didn't seem right he ain't had nothin' there ta show he was lost. We ain't had no body, but that ain't mean we couldn't have no kinda headstone. I carved a D into it an' Tyreese liked it so much that I made him one for Sasha. Then they told me they had others that could use markin', so I reckon I'm makin' markers for them now. I didn't know 'em, but if they belonged here, then they oughta get somethin'."

Sadie smiled. Most everyone here was so nice, so _gentle_. They called themselves a family and she understood what they meant by it. Since they'd arrived, they'd treated her and Mark as though they were family. Maybe they were cousins that they'd never met before at first, but slowly they'd become more and more comfortable with them. Sadie had entirely forgiven Daryl, who had apologized numerous times for injuring her. She'd grown to really like Carol and Michonne, Carl was enjoying sign language immensely and she loved having someone that she could chat with, even just about little things, in a way that was easy and familiar for her.

And then there was Beau. Sadie knew that Beau liked her, and she was flattered. He was a handsome young man, though she wasn't sure exactly how old he was. She could tell that he would only become more handsome as he aged, and Beau was a young man that was as likely to survive this as anyone was. He might be young, and maybe he wasn't very educated, but Sadie could easily tell that he was a smart young man in all the ways that mattered these days.

Sadie felt conflicted about Beau. She liked him being around her. She enjoyed his company. He talked a lot, but he was very conscious about talking to her directly, making sure that she understood, and he was always curious to hear whatever she had to say. Part of her felt like if she'd been younger, she would have wanted to pursue something with him. She'd have egged him on a little.

She was confident, now, that Beau had no idea what he was doing with females. None at all. He hadn't even picked up on the fact that glances were often cast his way from both Chelsea and Stella. Sadie didn't want to flatter herself into thinking it was because this was like some fairytale and he only had eyes for her. Granted, she could clearly see that he was trying to get closer to her, but she could also tell that he was fumbling.

Sadie didn't truly want a relationship with Beau, though, at least not a romantic one. The part of her that did want it was perhaps just the lonely part of her, the part that missed her husband, and missed the way he'd made her feel. Beau, though, was too young for her, or she was too old for him.

If there was a chance that they were going to make it for a long time, something Sadie hadn't imagined could ever be true only a month ago, Beau deserved someone his age. He deserved someone that he could spend the rest of his life with, and even better if that was to be a long life. Sadie knew that much. If there were anything between them, if Beau did actually feel something for her like she'd felt for her husband, she wouldn't want him to suffer losing that simply because she was too old to continue along beside him.

Still, she didn't have the heart to turn him away or force him toward the girls that she deemed more appropriate for him. Even though she didn't want a romantic relationship with him, she wanted something with Beau, even if it was just a friendship of sorts.

"That's sweet of you," she said, watching him whittle away at the angel. It was quickly taking shape in his hands. She could see the details starting to emerge.

"It's nothin'," Beau said, smiling his crooked smile.

"How did you learn to do it?" Sadie asked.

Beau shrugged. "I started doin' it when I was young. I started with the bars of soap in the house. I carved little animals out of 'em, cats, dogs, whatever I wanted to carve."

"Can you do anything?" Sadie asked.

Beau shrugged again. "I don't know, he said. I reckon I could." He stopped talking for a moment and then chuckled.

"What?" Sadie asked.

"Man, my ma, she used ta get so mad 'bout them soap bars. She'd gather up all the little shavin's an' she'd run 'em up under hot water, clumpin' 'em together. Then she'd make me use that soap, these real ugly lookin' big ole balls a' soap. Everyone else got to use the animals. Used ta be funny watchin' 'em melt, most of 'em lost their heads first. There'd be a whole headless zoo just sittin' up there in the soap tray," Beau said.

Sadie laughed in response. She could tell by Beau's face that he was far away for a moment, in another world, another place and time. It was a place that she went often as well. A nice place to visit every now and again.

"Did you make horses?" she asked.

Beau nodded.

"An' I could make a lotta elephants an' lions an' mess," he said. "If I could see it in my head, I could make it."

"What about giraffes?" Sadie asked.

Beau shrugged. "I don't know, I ain't never tried ta make one. Never had a bar a' soap big enough I reckon. When I started with wood I was makin' weapons. I wanted a sling shot, but my ma said I couldn't have one on account a' she thought I'd shoot birds an' stuff we wasn't gonna eat. I told her I wasn't gonna do that, but she was just that way. So I made my own. After that it was other things. I ain't made no animals ner nothin' outta wood, 'til I made them angels."

Sadie nodded her understanding and Beau went back to his whittling, his face covered in that far away expression. He stayed that way for a while, until Carl approached them, greeting Sadie in sign with a smile and then asking Beau to join him for something they "needed" him for.

Sadie could see Beau hesitating a minute and she urged him to go with Carl and do whatever it was the boy was obviously excited about. Beau smiled at her and slipped over the rail, forgetting her request that he use the steps. She watched the two of them jog off and then glanced at the seat next to her. The knife and the unfinished angel lie in the seat. He'd be back for them, that much was sure.

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Mark had been tediously picking Carol for a while now, but Michonne had to admit that his finished result was quite impressive. The longer Carol's hair had gotten, the more she'd just let it do whatever it was going to do, much like the approach that they had so far taken with the girls' hair, but Mark had been meticulous enough to secure some kind of pins and had trimmed it here, trimmed it there, and pinned in various places.

Carol protested most of the time, insisting that Mark, who was trying to make sense of the mess of curls and tangles, was ripping all her out, but Michonne knew she'd been really enjoying it. It wasn't often that anyone around there got pampered.

Michonne's attention was drawn by Daryl and Tyreese, coming toward them. Both seemed a little awkward, thought Michonne couldn't put her finger on why. It was normal for Daryl, but for Tyreese it seemed a little off.

"Well don't you look pretty!" Tyreese proclaimed. He walked over to Carol and lifted her chin, bending down to kiss her.

"You like it?" She asked grinning.

Tyreese smiled back at her. "I do, I like it a lot. I can see those pretty blue eyes without fighting for it," he said.

Michonne smiled at both of them, and noticed that Mark stood back, looking a little proud of himself. Daryl had disappeared for a moment, but she felt him lurking just behind her.

Tyreese trailed his finger down the neck of Carol's tank top.

"It's almost going to make me hate doing this," he said. Michonne noticed him shift something in his hand, and she might have figured out what it was, if she hadn't been distracted by water pouring down over her body and puddling in her lap. Carol shrieked at the same time and Michonne noticed her shirt was soaking wet. Both Daryl and Tyreese were cackling.

_Water balloons_, Michonne realized, gaining her feet suddenly. She realized that Carl and Beau were howling not far off, each of them pushing a wheelbarrow. The rest of the community was gathering around. Somehow they'd called them all together in one way or another and now there were two wheelbarrows full of water balloons.

Before Michonne could think any more about it, another made impact with her, exploding water all over her.

"That's not fair!" Carol yelled, holding up her arms just as another made contact with her. "We're unarmed."

Michonne laughed and made a run for one of the wheelbarrows. Everyone was pelting everyone else in the soggy confusion.

Daryl caught Michonne around the arms, hugging her to him.

"Careful, woman, don't slip out here an' hurt my baby," he said.

In one move she swung around and pressed against him, looking up at him. He kissed her before she could go in for the kiss that she'd been planning. She felt her back soaking, pelted either by direct fire or by simply being in the crossfire of the other cackling members of her group.

Even Maggie and Seth had joined in, though neither were close to being rehabilitated from their injuries. The best thing about this battle was that if you were hit, the worst it meant was that you might be a little _cleaner_ at the end.

The water, though not cool by any means, felt good, and Michonne smiled when she heard Judith and Hope both cackling. She glanced over, one of Daryl's arms still hooked around her, and saw Carl bursting balloons above their heads, the water raining down on them.

The water balloon battle hadn't lasted long. Like most battles they ran out of ammunition long before they thought they would. The street was soaked, most of the people were fairly wet, and there was a mess of exploded balloons to be collected. Their little attack also meant an impromptu water run, but it was all worth it. The smiles and excited faces were everywhere. No one had lost this battle. Everyone had won. There were no casualties, no injuries, no tears, and no bloodshed. All there was now were wet people that would be soon dried by the heat surrounding them and laughter and camaraderie.

Michonne suddenly felt wonderful. Daryl's arm was still protectively wrapped around her and she tipped her head back, laughing like so many of the others around her. She felt Daryl slip his other arm around her, pulling her into him and rocking with her. For at least a minute, she felt like life was _good_, maybe even better than they'd all thought it could be.


	83. Chapter 83

**AN: First off, thank you so much for reviewing and making me not feel so alone here.  
**

**Secondly, I realize that when we were waiting for Hope things passed much more quickly. That was mostly owing to fewer plot lines and therefore easier time lapses. Now time passes more slowly as we are playing around with other plot lines. Our newest little Dixon is growing, but we must await the arrival as much as anyone in the story. ;-)  
**

**If you've lost track of time, I'll help you out using my "calendar" that I've made up to roughly follow the events. Michonne is roughly 4/5 months pregnant at the time, so you'll be waiting for the winter to come before we even think of seeing a birth.  
**

**On another note, this chapter is a little different. Like some that we've seen before, this is a character/plot development chapter that focuses on some of our other characters. It is a Rick and Sadie centered chapter. No worries though, even though this chapter doesn't focus on our beloved couple, they haven't disappeared in the slightest! **

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Sadie had never questioned who Judith's parents were. It was obvious to her that one way or another the child belong to Carol and Tyreese, and biology mattered nothing to her. Paul was hers, and could even be said to be Mark's as far as she could tell. He was the one that woke her at night to care for the infant, and he was even willing to shoulder diaper changes and the like. Their relationship status, she assumed would mean little to nothing to the boy as he grew, and if he lived long enough to wonder about it she hoped that the fact that she'd never carried him nor birthed him would mean nothing.

She had always assumed, knowing well what that could do for someone, that Judith was Carol's daughter, and that Tyreese had accepted responsibility for her. She hadn't dared to ask how the child had been conceived. Such a question seemed ridiculous to her these days, and perhaps even a little cruel, given some of the situations she'd found herself in since the dead decided to ramble about.

It was only when Carl referred to Judith as his sister in one of their sign language lessons, and she'd made him verify it by both speaking and writing the word for her, that Sadie started to wonder.

Carl's mother wasn't with the group, and Sadie didn't know why. She assumed that his mother had died, but he hadn't offered the information and she wasn't one to press for details, especially not to someone Carl's age when it came to his mother. His father, Rick, had never really shown any sign of affection toward Judith, and that left her a little baffled.

She hated to pry, but she wanted answers to this, and Rick was unoccupied by anything at the moment. She could see him lazily swinging on the porch swing at his house. Sadie excused herself from Carl, offering the excuse that she was tired and Paul was hungry. They'd pick up their lessons and conversation the next day.

She was relieved when the boy thanked her and left, more excited by what he had learned for the day than disappointed that she'd cut him short of the time that she normally allotted for him.

She gathered up Paul, who was asleep and not hungry at all, and made her way toward Rick's porch, stopping only momentarily at the bottom before mounting the steps, admiring how whoever had constructed the neighborhood had managed to create almost cookie cutter houses, one after one.

"Is something wrong?" Rick asked when Sadie came up, drug a chair closer to the swing, and sat down with the baby.

"No," she said, leaning back in the chair.

Rick regarded the woman for a moment. He wasn't going to believe she was here without a purpose. That wasn't how Sadie worked, and he'd figured that much out by now.

"Is Judith Carl's sister?" Sadie asked after a few minutes.

Rick was taken aback by the question from her for second, but then settled in on it. She was still settling into the group. Unless it had come up in conversation she'd have no way of knowing all that they'd been through. She had, however, spent some time with Carl and he had little knowledge of what passed between them.

"She is," he said finally.

Sadie sat forward in her chair, regarding him a moment.

"Half-sister?" She asked.

Rick stared at her.

"Why do you ask?" He answered her question with one of his own.

Sadie sat back. "Your half, or your wife's?"

Rick swallowed. He suddenly realized the woman in front of him was unlike any that he'd known before.

"I don't know," he said finally, "if she's mine."

"What happened to your wife?" Sadie asked after a second.

"We lost her when Judith was born," Rick said. He realized that he'd never said that before, never so point blank, but something in the way that Sadie stared at him made him feel like that was the only way to respond.

The woman sat quietly a moment, contemplating. Then her face shifted.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I've lost people too."

Rick nodded at her.

The baby she was holding stirred and started to cry. Sadie tried to soothe him for a moment and Rick regarded her.

"Do you mind?" She asked, her hands going toward the hem of her shirt.

"No, it's fine," he said, swallowing.

Michonne and Sadie both breastfed when and where they pleased. Rick didn't mind the act at all, but somehow just now it stirred him a little that Sadie had no problem lifting her shirt and offering the whining infant her breast. Once he was quietly feeding she decided to continue her interrogation.

"I lost my husband," Sadie offered after a second. "My brother, my children, everyone, I guess," she said when she continued.

"I'm sorry to hear that," Rick said. He was surprised when she smiled in response.

"It's happened to us all, hasn't it?" She said. "It's what we do these days, we lose the people we care about. It hurts, but it gets better. I've mourned them, and I think my mourning is through." She looked away for a moment and then looked back at Rick. "At least it's done for a while. There are days."

Rick swallowed and cocked his head to the side. He understood what she meant. There were days that you thought you were fine, days that you thought you'd somehow gotten over everything that had happened, and then unexpectedly you'd be slammed with feeling. Something small, perhaps, something that meant nothing at all would bring it slamming back against you.

Sadie sat there quietly nursing the baby, not talking. Rick sat back in the swing, unsure of what to say to her. After a minute he just relaxed, deciding that perhaps they were through. Maybe she was just going to sit with him.

"My husband and I, we had five children. Three girls, two boys, all alternating, a perfect pattern," Sadie said after a bit, pulling her shirt down and burping the baby. "We left Atlanta with my brother and a group of people. The first big group of Walkers I saw attacked us at night when we were travelling. I had the baby, and my brother got my third child. We lost a lot of people that night. My husband, and three of my children. They were just gone in one night."

"I'm sorry to hear that," Rick said, still not sure exactly how to respond to Sadie. He wasn't sure why she was sitting in front of him right now telling him this story, but he wasn't going to stop her if she felt like she needed to share her story. Maybe she just wanted someone to listen to it. What surprised him most was the calmness with which she was speaking. He knew that she didn't tend to change her tone of voice often, and he didn't know if that was because she was deaf, or if it was a trait of hers, but her tone remained steady. She didn't even look upset, just like she was thinking. Her brows were only slightly knitted.

"The next big attack I lost my older daughter, but my brother kept me and the baby moving forward. I never knew where we were going, but we had to keep trying to get there," Sadie continued.

"I don't think any of us know where we're going anymore," Rick said. He knew for a fact that this group had no idea what the future held for them. Once upon a time they'd been planning on trying to get somewhere, not sure of where it was, just hoping they'd know it when they saw it.

Sadie nodded at him. She was quiet again for a minute, her head cocked to the side. She drew a foot up in the chair with her and supported the infant against her chest, rubbing its back.

"Then I lost my daughter. My last baby. A Walker took her right from me, and I couldn't do anything," Sadie said. "That was when I thought I wouldn't make it, but my brother made me keep going."

When she was quiet again, Rick waited. It was clear that she wasn't done, and he didn't try to interpret her silent hesitation. He just regarded her with the same intensity that she typically wore when she was looking at anyone.

Sadie shrugged, making a face after a minute. "Then the men came that killed all the men that were with us, and some of the women. I didn't care then. What were they going to take from me anyway? When the group we attacked came, and took everyone else. Only Mark came back for me," Sadie said.

Rick sat there, looking for what he was supposed to say.

"I'm sorry," he said, realizing how short it fell from the mark. He had listened to the story, trying to imagine how Sadie felt telling the story. She'd told it matter-of-factly, like she had been telling a story about someone _else_, not like it had been something she'd lived. "That's a lot to go through," he offered, still feeling like it wasn't adequate.

Sadie nodded at him, contemplating something.

"Have you mourned her yet?" Sadie asked after a minute.

Rick was caught off guard, still thinking about the story that he'd just heard.

"What?" He asked.

"Have you mourned her yet? Your wife? Have you mourned her?" Sadie asked. Something in her face was urging him to answer. When she asked you a question, he thought, you knew that she expected an answer and she wasn't going to just let the question go. She wore the facial expression while she sat silently waiting for him to reply.

"I have," Rick said. "At least I think I have, I don't know. It's complicated…" he hesitated, not quite knowing what he wanted to say. "It was a complicated situation," he finished.

"The mourning?" Sadie asked.

"We haven't had much time for mourning, just time here and there," Rick said.

"So you're still mourning her?" Sadie asked.

"I still miss her," Rick said after a minute, wondering why it was that he felt like he needed to continue, why it was that he _wanted_ to keep talking. "I feel guilty. I never took the time…" he stopped again. "I just didn't make things _right_, and I wanted to make things _right_."

"Make what right?" Sadie asked.

Rick felt himself growing a little annoyed. He had dismissed this conversation before. Carl hadn't talked about it much, hadn't pushed him. Everyone else had left him alone to deal with his loss. Rachel had never really asked him about it. She didn't care, and he liked sometimes that she didn't care. He hadn't had to really talk about it. But now here he was, sitting on his porch swing and this woman who had never even met Lori was sitting directly in front of him, expecting him to answer questions he didn't know if he even could answer.

"My wife," Rick started, "she thought I was dead when this all started. She left with my son and my best friend. I found them later with the group," Rick said.

"With this group?" Sadie asked.

Rick thought back. For a moment it struck him to think how much the group had changed since the day that he'd found them, coming back to report to a bunch of strangers that they'd left a man handcuffed on a roof and barely made it out of Atlanta with their lives. They had been coming back to tell Daryl that his brother was handcuffed to a roof.

"Daryl, Carol, Glenn…and others…we've lost the others since then," Rick said.

Sadie nodded.

"So you found her and Carl, and then?" Sadie urged.

"Well, my best friend…I don't know what happened…I guess he went crazy, I guess maybe he loved Lori, or both, I don't know," Rick said.

Sadie looked at him, somewhat confused but intently focused on him and curious.

"I killed him," Rick said after a minute. He started to choke a little, feeling the memories coming back. The pain was still there. He hadn't wanted to kill Shane, and no matter if Lori had ever thought it was out of cold blood or not, he knew it hadn't been, but he'd felt sometimes that she looked at him differently after that. He'd worried sometimes that she had maybe been angry with him for it, like she would have preferred that things had been different, maybe even that Shane had been the one to return that night.

Rick realized that Sadie looked even more confused and perhaps a little worried.

"He tried to kill me," Rick explained. He suddenly felt his mouth dry and wished that he had water. This was a story that he hadn't wanted to tell. He couldn't stop, though, he already knew that. "I had to kill him first," he said, shrugging.

"Why did he try to kill you?" Sadie asked. "Because he loved your wife?"

Rick shrugged and brushed his forehead with his hand.

"I don't know what Lori thought," Rick continued, "but sometimes I think that she didn't believe me. Maybe she thought I did it because I wanted to. It was like we didn't know how to communicate anymore, like I didn't know what to say to her and she didn't know what to say to me. The way she looked at me…I didn't know how to take the way she looked at me," Rick continued. He stopped a moment and pinched his nose. He felt Sadie touching him on the leg and he looked up. She had a look of something in her eyes. It wasn't sympathy, maybe it was compassion, but it was a comforting look. "It was just hard," Rick said.

Sadie nodded.

"Marriage is hard," she said. "Relationships are hard. They always have been, but now, like this, with whatever this is…" She looked around, like she was trying to define the nightmarish landscape that they'd all been walking through all this time.

"My marriage wasn't perfect before all of this," Rick said. "I thought I could make it right, though. I thought we'd make it somewhere safe…" He trailed off and looked around. Maybe this community, maybe this life that they knew now, maybe that's what he'd thought that they could find. It was the closest thing he'd seen so far to the dream that he'd had. "I thought that we'd make it to a place to be safe, and then I could make it right. We'd all be safe and then we could make our marriage good again, make it what we wanted it to be."

"But you didn't make it?" Sadie asked.

Rick swallowed, feeling the tears welling up inside him. He pushed them back. He wasn't going to cry in front of a woman who had just told him how much she had lost since all this happened without choking once.

Rick finally shook his head. Sadie's hand returned to his leg.

"I never made it right…" he said. "I never got the chance to…I never told her so much," Rick said.

Suddenly he was feeling frustrated, almost angry. He didn't want Sadie's sympathy and he didn't like the way she was looking at him right now, like she wasn't shocked by what he was telling her. Like she didn't hold it against him. He held it against himself, and he felt like she should too.

"I didn't talk to her," Rick said. "Lori always said I didn't talk about things, and I didn't. I don't know why I'm talking about it now," he got up and started across the porch, turning and pacing back. Sadie got up and scurried after him. "I'm talking about it now, and I couldn't ever talk about it with her," he said.

Sadie swallowed hard, her eyes a little wide and he realized that he was gripping her arm. He thought about it a minute, realizing he was holding her too roughly. He hadn't meant to reach out and grab her arm like that, holding her in front of him. When he relaxed his grip, her face relaxed.

"We're all different," Sadie said. "We all change. You're safe here, right now. It's easier to talk about our feelings when we have time to feel them."

Rick sighed and returned to the swing. Sadie sat in front of him again, soothing the baby that had become upset when she'd gotten up from the chair.

"Relationships are hard, and they don't always work. Sometimes it isn't anyone's fault," Sadie said.

Rick chuckled a little.

"Yeah, relationships are hard," he said. He thought about it. He thought about the people around him. Hershel told stories about his wives, both of them, beautiful stories. Dora and Frank had lived most of their lives together and they had died together. All around him people were _happy_ in their relationships. And Sadie sat in front of him now, listening to his story, and telling him that relationships were hard. He laughed a little at it.

"What is funny?" Sadie asked.

"Relationships are hard," Rick repeated. "Except for I'm not seeing a lot of hard relationships around here, Sadie. There's Daryl and Michonne, Glenn and Maggie, Tyreese and Carol…hell even Junior and Beth…but relationships are hard."

"You can't compare your life with someone else's," Sadie said. "Your reality is yours, and theirs is theirs. It's the same with relationships. If yours wasn't perfect, it doesn't mean that it was anyone's fault. It was just the relationship. They are happy, but it doesn't mean that they don't have to work for it, it just means that in the end, they are happy," she said.

"I wanted to be happy with Lori. I _was_ happy with Lori. It wasn't always bad," Rick said.

"Circumstances," Sadie said.

Rick stared at her a moment, and she stared back at him, unwavering.

"And Rachel?" Sadie asked. "Is it hard with Rachel?"

Rick chuckled again. He didn't have a relationship with Rachel, not really. Essentially they were just playing house, and they weren't very good at that. He'd seen Sadie and Mark doing a better job of playing house together. At least it was obvious they cared about each other, even though Mark was openly gay, and as far as he could tell Sadie was celibate.

"No," he said, "it isn't hard with Rachel because there's nothing there. I don't want anything there, nothing like I wanted with Lori."

Sadie looked thoughtful for a moment, nodded again.

"You can't change things with your wife," she said after a few minutes. Then she shrugged. "We can't change the past. You can mourn it, you can miss it, but you can't change it."

Rick looked at her, not responding.

"What about Judith?" Sadie asked, returning to her original line of questioning. "Do you care about her?"

"I don't know if she's mine," Rick said. He pinched the bridge of his nose. He had no idea how he felt about the child. He felt like Carol was right. He felt like he didn't know her. He knew that everyone looked at him like he was supposed to do something, like he was doing something wrong. Part of him felt guilty for having abandoned the child to Carol, but he didn't know what to do anymore. Now he had no idea what he was supposed to do, or even if there was anything to be done.

"Oh," Sadie said. "You think she might be your best friend's baby?"

Rick shrugged and put his head in his hand.

Sadie touched him on the leg after a minute and looked around.

"He's not here," she said.

"No, he's not here. I told you…I told you what happened," Rick responded.

Sadie nodded.

"It must be hard," Sadie said after a minute, "to think of loving a child when you don't know if it's yours."

Rick looked at her. She had paused, but she wasn't really looking at him and he could tell she would continue before long.

"I know that Paul isn't mine…" she said. "Carol and Tyreese know that Judith isn't theirs…but it must be really hard when you don't know."

Rick got annoyed then. Her tone of voice didn't change, but he was certain that if sarcasm had a facial expression he was staring at it now. He felt himself starting to grow angry with the woman in front of him.

"That's different," he said.

"You're right, it is," Sadie said, nodding her head enthusiastically. "For you there's at least a chance that Judith is your daughter, that's very different."

"So you're like everyone else," Rick said. "You think that I'm doing wrong by not being a father to Judith."

Sadie nodded. "Do you think you're doing wrong?"

"I don't know," Rick said. "I don't know what to do anymore. I don't know if it's too late."

Sadie sat there a moment.

"It's never too late," Sadie said, "not while we're still alive. It's only too late when something happens." She looked at him for a minute and he had no idea what she wanted from him. "You feel guilty about your wife," she continued, "and that may go away, or it may not. Do you want to feel guilty about Judith if something happens?"

"I don't even know her," Rick said. "She doesn't know me. She knows Carol and Tyreese."

"You're right, and you're wrong," Sadie said, sighing.

"And you're going to tell me why, right?" Rick asked, trying to control the slight annoyance that was building again. He hadn't asked her to come and interrogate him like this.

Sadie nodded. "She knows Carol and Tyreese, and she's happy with them, but that doesn't mean that she can't know you too. You can be someone to her, you just have to decide who you want to be."

Rick chuckled.

"It's that easy, is it?" He asked. "I just _decide_ who I want to be to Judith, and then there it is. I don't even know where to begin, Sadie. I don't even know what to do. I haven't been there for her and all this time she's been fine without me."

"Of course she's been fine without you," Sadie said. "We don't miss people before we know them."

Sadie stood up and Rick watched her, curious as to what she was doing.

"Here," she said. "Hold Paul, just a minute." He furrowed his brow at her and took the baby.

Sadie smiled at him, not saying anything and trotted down the stairs, disappearing.

Rick sat awkwardly, holding the sleeping baby. He suddenly felt very tired. He hadn't talked about all of this before, and thinking through everything that had happened was exhausting. It wasn't how he had intended to spend what he thought would be a quiet afternoon. Now he was sitting here, holding Sadie's baby, and wondering where the woman had disappeared to and how long it would be before she decided to come back.

When Sadie did come back, she was carrying Hope and Judith was toddling beside her. She reached down, taking the little girl's hand and helping her up the porch steps.

"I got them both as a two for one deal," Sadie said, smiling.

She put Hope down and the little girl started across the porch, apparently finding something that caught her attention. Sadie watched after her for a second before picking Judith up. Rick watched them interacting for a second and realized that Sadie was signing to Judith, and Judith was responding in sign.

"You taught her to sign?" Rick asked.

"Babies learn easily," Sadie said. "Sign language is easy for babies."

Rick smiled.

"Jude, this is Rick," Sadie said, smiling at Judith who smiled back at her, touching her face with her palm for a minute. "Rick, this is Judith," Sadie said. "Rick wants to hold you, Jude. Can you let him hold you?"

Judith looked at Sadie for a minute and then looked at Rick, smiling. He couldn't help but smile back. She was pretty, and there was a lot of Lori in her features. Sadie put her arm out and he passed her back the baby. She shifted her weight toward him and he reached his arms out to Judith who responded by reaching hers toward him. He took her and held her against his hip. It was the first time he'd held her since she was very small.

"Hope!" Judith called, pointing at Hope who was toddling around. She had apparently found something of interest and Sadie rushed over, prying the unsuspecting beetle out of the girl's hand before she could eat it.

"No, Hope, we don't eat bugs," Sadie said. Rick watched her. Hope looked up at her, grinning.

He looked back at Judith who was watching both of them.

"Hey, Judith," he said. Judith smiled at him, putting her fingers in her mouth. He reached up and pulled her hand out of her mouth. "Don't suck your fingers," he said. Judith regarded him for a minute, knitting her eyebrows together. She put her fingers back in her mouth and Rick pulled them out again. Judith glared at him, but didn't return her fingers to her mouth.

Sadie came back over to him, the baby in one arm, and Hope on the other hip, ripping at her hair and smiling.

"Step one," Sadie said, looking at Rick. "Now, why don't you take Jude on a walk? She likes the fields."

Rick looked at the little girl a minute, wondering if she would protest when they started to leave the porch.

"You want to go for a walk?" He asked.

Judith didn't respond to him.

"Jude, do you want to go with Rick to see the vegetables?" Sadie asked.

"I pick 'quash?" Judith asked.

Rick smiled.

"You can pick some squash if there's any down there, let's go look," Rick said.

Sadie smiled. "I'm going to go now," she said. "See you at dinner."

Rick nodded at her. "Thanks," he said.

Sadie smiled again.

"Don't mention it, I'm a good listener," she said, turning and started off the step with Hope waving at him over his shoulder.

Rick waited a minute, wondering if Judith would start to cry, but she didn't. The only thing she did was wave back at Hope and then regard him. He started down the steps then, chuckling to himself as he realized that Sadie's description of herself, though somewhat ironic, was also a very good description. She _was_ a good listener.


	84. Chapter 84

"Daryl! Do not pull on my rabbit's ears!" Carol barked. Daryl jumped, losing his grip on the rabbit he was trying to reach in the pen. He hadn't expected her to be behind him.

"I was tryin' ta get that fat one right there," Daryl said, pulling his arm out of the pen and sitting back in the grass. "I was gonna ask ya if she's pregnant so I could move her to the other pen," he explained.

He was proud of their rabbit collection. It had grown, and even though they had butchered a few, it seemed like they kept replenishing themselves. Carol had already mentioned they had to figure out something to do with them when winter came, and Daryl was beginning to wonder if they could make an indoor rabbit house in one of the houses they weren't using to keep from building anything new.

The rabbit Daryl was going after was a newer arrival, one that Beau had brought in from trapping a few days ago, and Daryl didn't know if it was a boy or a girl, but it wasn't as friendly as the ones they'd had longer. It didn't want him to catch it, that much he was sure of, and the others wouldn't get out of his way.

"I don't care what you were doing," Carol said, coming over and getting on her knees to reach into the opening to the pen. Daryl crawled back and out of her way a little. She could almost crawl entirely in the opening that he struggled to reach through. He wondered if Tyreese had done that on purpose. "Don't pick them up by the ears, ever," Carol said. She backed out of her position, and hugged the rabbit that had been evading him to her chest. It didn't look like it had run from her at all and Daryl was irritated that he'd been chasing it around for at least ten minutes.

"Who are you? Fuckin' Snow White?" He growled.

Carol smiled at him. "If you pull their ears, they aren't going to like you. No wonder some of them have been scratching and biting me more. You've been torturing them when I'm not looking." She held the rabbit up, examining it for a minute. "She's a girl, and I think you're right, I think she is pregnant."

Daryl got up from his spot and reached an arm out to Carol. She let him help her up and he closed the rabbit pen back before anyone could plan an escape. She started toward one of the other pens in the network that Tyreese had built for her.

"Instead of pulling on my rabbits' ears, why don't you take the bucket of water I've got in the shade by the front steps down to the fields. It's ready for drinking and it's hot enough that I'm sure everyone down there would appreciate some water. Michonne's down there, so you can check on her when you go," Carol commanded, already opening the other pen's door.

Daryl didn't respond to her, but he did go around front, easily finding the bucket that was marked by the various cups floating in it. He picked it up, stopping a moment to watch what Beth and Stella were doing. He knew they were helping Carol can things, but he had no idea what the process was all about. It just involved a lot of water and firewood, that much he knew.

"You thirsty?" He asked as he walked by them, offering them the bucket. Both of them were drenched in sweat. Beth refused the water, but he stood there a moment while Stella dipped one of the cups out and gulped down the water, thanking him.

When he was done there, he started toward the fields, careful not to slosh the water out of the bucket.

When Daryl got to the fields, he sat the bucket down and watched everyone for a minute. Everyone was doing something, but hardly anyone was talking to anyone else. These past few days they'd been busy, but everyone was enjoying what they were doing. All of them were running off a constant stream of commands from Carol, and Daryl had been so busy this morning that he'd been scared to turn around, thinking he might run into himself heading off in a different direction.

He spotted Michonne watering plants and made his way toward her.

"Come get ya some water, 'Chonne, 'fore it gets too hot. They ain't no shade out here to put it in," He called, approaching her. Michonne stopped what she was doing for a minute, turning to look at him, and then went back to it.

"I'll get some in a second, Daryl, when I'm ready to refill," she said.

Daryl smiled, deciding to tease her a little.

"Why you waterin' 'Chonne?" He asked.

Michonne could hear the tone of voice and she didn't even have to look at Daryl to know that he was going to start ribbing her. In the past week alone she felt like she'd gained at least two inches in her belly, and Daryl loved it. He had also finally achieved the ability to feel the baby, and he was enjoying that too. Now, apparently, it had his spirits high enough that he was going to try to get her dander up.

"I'm watering because I don't feel like picking," Michonne responded.

"It's 'cause you can't pick, ain't it, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked.

Michonne glanced at him.

"I _can_ do it, Daryl, but I don't want to and I don't have to, so I'm watering," She responded. She wasn't irritated at all, she was in a good mood, but he liked irritating her from time to time, so she tried to make it sound like she was a little annoyed.

"It's OK, 'Chonne, I wouldn't want'cha doin' all that bendin' down and squshin' the baby no way," Daryl said. Michonne realized that he was done teasing for the moment. She emptied her watering can and he reached out and took it from her. "Now go get ya some water, you look thirsty."

"How can anyone look thirsty, Daryl?" Michonne asked, turning and heading toward the bucket where Jimmy was standing, quenching his own thirst.

"Well, if'n they can look thirsty, you look thirsty," Daryl said, keeping step beside her.

Michonne took one of the cups and gulped down the contents. She missed having cold water to drink when the temperature was like this. The only time the water seemed really cool right now was when it was in the creek, and they never drank it fresh. They always boiled it first to make sure that it wasn't contaminated in any way. Michonne refilled her cup and drank it down again.

"See, you was thirsty," Daryl said.

Michonne thought about it a minute. The creek water wasn't cold, but it was cool, and right now she thought it would be amazing to soak herself in it. She knew that she could convince Beau, who was doing almost constant water runs with Carl, to bring her a bucket of it directly, but even drenching herself that way wasn't what she wanted. She contemplated, refilling the cup and drinking the water slowly, looking at Daryl.

"What'cha thinkin', 'Chonne, 'cause it looks like you up ta somethin'," Daryl said.

"Daryl, how would you like it if you and I slipped off together for a bit?" Michonne asked after a minute. She finished the water and put the cup back, moving closer to Daryl.

He eyed her a little nervously.

"In the middle of the day, 'Chonne? We got a lot to do…" he said quietly.

Michonne pushed herself against him, kissing him. She pulled back gaining eye contact.

"Let's slip down to the creek," she whispered. "Go for a little swim," she urged.

"I told you that ya ain't goin' outside them gates," Daryl responded.

Michonne kissed him again and then put her mouth near his ear.

"Me and you, alone, skinny dipping," she whispered. "Cool and wet…"

Daryl started to pull away from her and Michonne tried not to smile. She had his attention, and she knew that.

"It ain't safe," Daryl said.

"We'll just be down at the creek. Beau and Carl have been running water all day, they'd hear us if anything happened," Michonne whispered. "There's so much going on in here that most of the Walkers are more interested in what's going on inside our fences than they are in what's going on outside them. It'll be fine," she urged.

Daryl looked hesitant, but she thought he wasn't far from giving in. Michonne kissed him again, nipping his bottom lip and tugging it a little.

"Get a room," Junior said. Michonne became aware of him just behind her. "Or at least get away from the water bucket, geez."

Daryl went crimson and Michonne snickered.

"What do you say? Somethin' better than a room? I'll be with you, you can protect me," Michonne urged.

Daryl sighed, and shifted. She was sure he was turned on, and probably a little uncomfortable.

"Fine, 'Chonne, but you stayin' right with me so I can take care of ya," Daryl said.

Michonne smiled.

"Thank you, Daryl. I'll go get my katana and your crossbow. Meet you at the gates," she said. She turned and left him standing there awkwardly holding the watering can that he'd taken from her.

11111111111111111111111111111111111111111111

"What are you doing?" Carol called when she saw Michonne headed toward the gate where Daryl was standing, carrying her katana strapped across her back and his crossbow thrown over her shoulder.

"It's fine, Carol, we're just going to step out for some fresh air, can you keep an eye on Hope, please?" Michonne called back. She didn't listen to Carol's response. She was anxious to get Daryl out of the gates before Carol could stop what she was doing and make her way over there to start trying to talk him out of it.

Maggie and Seth, both of whom were recuperating, were on watch duty, it being the easiest job available that still left them feeling like they were doing _something_.

"Open up," Michonne said, approaching them. She handed Daryl his crossbow.

Maggie looked at them both, a hesitant look on her face.

"It's alright," Daryl said.

Maggie made a face, but didn't say anything. She opened up the gate and they both passed through. Michonne pulled her katana and quickly swiped the heads off of two of the Walkers nearby. She paused a second, waiting for two more that were approaching. She swiped at them just as she heard them closing the gates behind her. She turned, facing Daryl now who was just staring at her.

"I thought I was takin' care of ya," Daryl said after a minute.

"Just clearing the gates," Michonne said, shrugging. "There's one coming to your left."

Daryl dropped his sight away from her, stabbed the approaching Walker with an arrow, and paused again before starting forward with Michonne toward the creek.

As they walked, they didn't see many Walkers, and it seemed like Michonne had been right. Most of them were probably drawn to the fences of the community by the sounds inside. When they did see one ambling toward them, Michonne unsheathed her katana and walked toward it, lopping its head in half before Daryl could say anything. So far she hadn't allowed him to kill any of the stragglers that had taken an interest in them.

"You gotta stop doin' that," he said when she turned to walk back toward him.

"Everything's fine, Daryl," she said. "The baby didn't even wake up. I'm not even tired. In fact, I was more tired watering crops," she argued.

"Still, I told ya that I would take care of the Walkers and you keep chasin' after 'em," Daryl said.

"Stop, Daryl. If there were more than one or two at a time I know you'd help, but I feel great and I _wanted_ to kill the few we've seen. I'm not overdoing it or anything, I promise," Michonne responded. She could see the water, just ahead. She turned a little.

"Where we goin'?" Daryl asked.

"Downstream a little," Michonne said. "You don't want Beau and Carl coming for water and getting a free show, do you?"

"You got a point, 'Chonne," Daryl said. He followed her to the water's edge a little down from where they collected water and put their weapons on the ground near the edge so that he could get to them in a hurry while they were in the water, if such a need arose. These days he wasn't sure if he was more afraid of a surprise herd of Walkers or of the approach of some unknown person. Either way, he wanted the weapons where he could get to them fast. He wasn't taking any chances out here if he could avoid it, not with Michonne with him.

Daryl watched as Michonne started peeling off her clothes. He was waiting to take his own clothes off, not wanting to miss watching her. When her shirt was off, she turned toward him, and he swallowed hard, a little embarrassed that he'd just been standing there watching her. He wondered what she thought about it. She smiled at him after a second.

"Do you think you can stop staring long enough to help me get my pants off?" She asked.

Daryl came over and helped her pull them off with her leaning propped against him, her hand on his back while she freed one foot and then the other. She stood there, naked, for a moment when Daryl raised himself back up.

"How long has it been, Daryl?" Michonne asked him. He really liked the way she was smiling at him right now, but he blushed a little.

"How long's it been since what, 'Chonne?" He asked.

"Since you first saw me naked?" She asked. "If I remember correctly, you were still wearing all your clothes then, too, and you looked just about as embarrassed."

Daryl bit at his thumb, realizing that she was right, in some ways this was a lot like it had been at the pharmacy and now he would have to wrestle out of his clothes while she waited on him. Daryl started to take off his boots.

"You didn't look like you'd been eatin' watermelon seeds then," Daryl said, glancing up momentarily.

Michonne rubbed her belly.

"No, I didn't look like this then," Michonne said. "And I'd say cantaloupes maybe, but not watermelons, not just yet."

Once Daryl was free of his boots he made short work of peeling off the rest of his clothes. He was highly aroused, and was a little embarrassed at first when he stepped out of his pants. Michonne was wading into the water now.

"Be careful, 'Chonne, them rocks could be slippery," he said. He started toward her, trying to shake off his embarrassment. She didn't seem to notice, or either she didn't care. She did stop, though, barely in the edge of the water and waited for him to get there, stepping in next to her and wrapping his arm around her waist.

They waded into the water together. It wouldn't have been water that Daryl would necessarily have considered cool, but in contrast to the outside heat it was. Michonne moaned as they waded out into the deeper part of the creek and submerged themselves. The water wasn't very deep, but they could easily lower themselves enough to be covered.

Daryl looked at Michonne, her eyes closed, her head tipped back. He was hovering over her, his arm lazily wrapped around her, holding her up a little. He kissed her throat and she held her head back farther. He licked at the water droplets that were resting there, licking up to her jaw and then kissing her.

She moaned again, her eyes still closed. She returned his kiss, flopping against his arm and floating lightly in the water.

"I ain't never made love in no creek before," Daryl said.

"That makes two of us," Michonne said, still not opening her eyes. "But I'm willing to try if you are," she finished.

Daryl kissed her again, one hand finding her breast while the other held her to him. She felt light in his arms, and cool from the water, and he had to admit that it there was something very calming about the moment, but very exciting as well. He tried to ground himself, his knees in the rocks below him, trying to figure out exactly how to go about this with the weightlessness that the water provided them, but not wanting to rise up out of it enough to seek gravity.

When he finally positioned himself in a way where he thought he could accomplish his goal and keep Michonne from touching the creek floor below them, not wanting her to be ground into the rocks and gravel, he entered her and she wrapped herself around him. Her change in position surprised him, but aided him as well.

Michonne moaned loudly.

"Gotta be quiet, 'Chonne," Daryl gasped. This wasn't a moment when he wanted to be surprised by Walkers. Michonne responded to him by trying to hold back her moans of pleasure.

Daryl was surprised when Michonne came long before he felt he was ready. Normally he found himself trying to hold out to make sure that she made it, but this time he still felt like he wasn't there, and she had buried her face against him, stifling her cries. Daryl continued, spurred on by the fact that Michonne was still responding to him, wrapped around him, her fingers digging into him. She came again, just as he'd found his own release, and for a moment they remained there, in the same position.

Michonne pulled away first.

"That was pretty damn incredible," she said, breathing hard.

Daryl smiled at her.

"It was that," he said. "I reckon we didn't do too bad for a first time."

Michonne snickered at him.

"I'd say we did _great_ for a first time," She said.

Daryl ducked under the water, enjoying the feeling of complete relaxation coupled with the refreshing water. Michonne floated just inches away from him. He rested there, his hands keeping him from floating off anywhere and from sinking down, and he watched her, passing his eyes every now and again around the banks surrounding them. He wasn't going to rush her back. He'd wait until she'd had her fill of the water.

1111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111

When they'd finally decided to head back to the community, deciding that they'd been gone long enough and were cool enough to return, they both dressed quickly, with Daryl helping Michonne.

Michonne felt incredible. She couldn't stop herself from smiling at the moment. Daryl looked like he was feeling pretty good too. He grinned at her when he put her katana in her hands. She quickly put it on, and waited for him to shoulder his crossbow.

She leaned over, kissing him again, and she felt his hand go to her belly. The baby was kicking, but he had his hand in the wrong place, so she reached around and moved it for him. He grinned at her again, not saying anything. After a moment he dropped his hand, put his other hand on the small of her back and pushed her gently in the direction of the community.

They walked along, slowly. Michonne hated for the outing to end. For once she was going to hate seeing the fences appear in front of her.

They caught the attention of a Walker, and it started toward them. Michonne waited, deciding she'd let Daryl kill it since she hadn't let him kill any that they'd seen before.

"Go get him, woman," Daryl said after a second. Michonne turned and looked at him and he smiled a half smile at her. She walked forward and killed the Walker quickly, slinging her katana clean and re-sheathing it. She shot Daryl a questioning look, wondering why he hadn't protested like he had the entire way down to the creek. "We 'bout to be back at the gates soon," Daryl said after a minute, "and then you ain't gon' get to kill ya no more Walkers for a while, so I figured I'd let ya have the ones on the way there, as long as there ain't too many of 'em."

Michonne smiled and wrapped her arm around Daryl's back.

"That's the most romantic gift I've ever heard of before," Michonne said.

Daryl chuckled.

"You know me, 'Chonne, if I ain't nothin' else, I'm a romantic kinda guy," Daryl responded. "Just don't tell no one, OK?"

"I wouldn't dream of it," Michonne said, seeing the gates just ahead with Maggie and Seth already moving to open them. There were three Walkers bunching around them, and she unsheathed her katana, knowing that Daryl wasn't going to protest her clearing the gates for them to pass back inside.


	85. Chapter 85

Daryl was busy crawling on his knees along the rows pulling out the grass and weeds that was growing between plants, just as he'd been instructed to do. From time to time he stopped what he was doing to look around at those who were working in his vicinity, concerned that someone might not be paying him much attention and might accidentally trip over him or step on him. There was quite a bit of chaos as everyone scrambled about, and most things were possible.

Daryl stopped what he was doing, sat back and wiped his face with his arm to get the sweat off his forehead. If he hadn't already told Michonne that their trip to the creek the day before was absolutely the only time that she was leaving the community before the baby came, he might have suggested they make another run for it. He wasn't going back on what he said, though, or she might try to use that as leverage when he didn't want her to go anywhere.

Michonne wasn't far off, watering a little bit behind where he was weeding. She seemed absent, almost, and he wondered what she thought about when she was doing things like this, not talking to anyone else, almost oblivious of their presence.

Daryl got up and went over to the water bucket, dipping some out and tasting it. He frowned. It was hot, and hot water on a hot day didn't exactly do much for thirst. He hoped Carol was sending some fresh water down soon.

"Is the water any good?" Rick asked, walking up. Daryl turned, regarding him a moment, surprised to see that he had Judith with him.

"No, hot as piss," Daryl said. "Carol ain't sent none down in a while. What you doin' with Jude?"

"Carol's not going to be sending any down for a while, but I'll walk back to headquarters and tell them we need water," Rick said. "Judith is spending a little time helping me out today. Carol and Tyreese left her with me."

"What do you mean they left her with you?" Daryl asked.

"They're gone," Rick said. "They took a pickup truck and left at least an hour ago."

Daryl narrowed his eyes. He hadn't heard anything about this.

"Where the hell'd they go?" He asked.

Rick shrugged. "I don't know. I came by to see if Judith might want to come help me pick for a bit and Carol said it was a great idea for me to take her because they were leaving for a while."

"And you didn't ask where the hell they was goin'?" Daryl asked.

"I thought they were going on a run," Rick said. "I don't keep up with what everyone does, Daryl."

Daryl grabbed the bucket up and started toward headquarters. He wanted to know where they'd gone, and he wanted to know where the hell his kid was since she was supposed to be with Carol.

As Daryl neared headquarters he veered toward the gates, not putting the bucket down. Maggie was sitting alone in one of the plastic chairs near the gates, looking bored and poking at a Walker through the bars with a long stick that may have been a broom handle.

"Where the fuck is Carol?" Daryl asked as he neared her. Maggie's attention snapped in his direction and she paused in her activity for a moment.

"She's gone with Tyreese," Maggie said. "They went to clean out what they could from the orchard that we found. She wants to can whatever fruit is left out there."

"And she didn't tell nobody?" Daryl asked.

Maggie grinned at him and raised her eyebrows. "She told me, which is more than you can say about your little excursion yesterday with Michonne. I guess Carol figured she owed you for that."

Daryl huffed and Maggie went back to harassing the Walker. She was far enough away from it that no matter how tightly it pressed itself against the bars, it couldn't reach her.

"Where the hell's my kid?" Daryl asked.

Maggie stopped poking the Walker again.

"Stella has Hope and Paul. She's in your front yard in the shade. They found a little wading pool and filled it up with water," Maggie responded. "Your kids is fine."

Daryl pulled his knife out of his belt and quickly stabbed the Walker through the bars.

"Hey!" Maggie protested as it crumpled to the ground.

Daryl walked off without saying anything to her, stopping long enough to toss the bucket in the direction of Beth who was working near one of the fires that they had burning.

"They need water down at the fields," he growled.

He continued on until he got to his front yard. There, in the shade, Hope was sitting in a blue plastic pool playing with various floating toys. Stella sat in the grass near her holding Paul. Daryl felt relieved, not really knowing what he expected. It wasn't that he doubted the girl was capable of watching Hope, but he liked to know where Hope was, and that moment of not having an answer to that question bothered him.

"Da Da!" Hope called, grinning up at him. She stood up in the pool and reached for him.

"No, sit down Hope," Daryl said.

For a minute she looked like she might cry. She was at least considering it.

"Don't cry, Hope, Daddy's gotta do other things right now and you're naked as a jaybird. Sit down and play with your toys," he said. Hope considered him a moment longer and then got down on her hands and knees in the water, splashing around again after one of the toys. "You alright with them?" Daryl asked, turning his attention to Stella.

"Me? I'm fine," Stella said. "I'd rather be here than out there in the sun," she said.

"Did Carol say how long they thought they'd be gone?" Daryl asked.

Stella shook her head slowly.

"No, she just asked me to keep an eye on them," Stella said. "I was going to try to find bathing suits for everyone, but it's so hot out here I thought that they might as well go naked. Probably cooler that way."

Daryl grunted.

Rick came up behind him then.

"I think she could use a cool down," Rick said. He put Judith on the ground and started undressing her, pulling her fingers out of her mouth a couple of times. Daryl stood and watched him. When Judith was undressed, he helped her get into the pool and she immediately started to play with Hope. "I'm leaving her with you, Stella," Rick said.

"I've got it," Stella responded, not shifting from her position next to the pool.

As Rick turned and started back toward the fields, Daryl fell in step beside him.

"So the two of them just took off," Daryl said. "Said they was goin' ta get what was left of the fruit in that orchard Maggie and Glenn found."

"Canned fruit will be nice to have," Rick said. He snickered after a minute.

"What's so funny?" Daryl asked.

"Well, we all know you took off yesterday without any explanation, I wouldn't be surprised if this is Carol's passive aggressive response to that," Rick said.

Daryl thought about it. That would be something that Carol would probably do, but she hadn't said anything about it getting under her skin that they'd gone off like that, she'd just questioned them when they got back about if they'd run into any trouble. Normal questions when someone had been outside the community.

Daryl was calming down, though. He was worried that they were out there alone, but it was still a long time from sun down. He hoped they didn't run into any trouble, and that they'd at least been smart enough about it to be prepared for whatever they might run into. He knew, at least, that Tyreese might not be able to control Walker herds, but he wouldn't let them fall victim to any nasty _people_ that they might encounter.

"Judith doesn't seem to have any problem going with me," Rick said. He broke Daryl's concentration.

"Huh?" Daryl grunted.

"I said Judith doesn't seem to have any problem going with me," Rick repeated. He'd been surprised, expecting her to be upset about being in his presence when she wasn't used to it, but she hadn't seem bothered in the slightest.

"Jude's good about goin' with anybody," Daryl said. "She ain't a fussy young'un."

Daryl saw Rick's face change a little. Daryl stopped for a minute, thinking that maybe Rick had meant something different. He'd been spending a little time with Judith the past couple of days, and Daryl recognized that for whatever reason he was trying to make some kind of effort with the child. He realized now that he might have made Rick feel like it wasn't as great of an effort as it was.

"I'm sorry, man, I didn't mean nothin' by that, I just had other things on my mind. I'm sure Judith likes ya, an' she's gon' learn to like ya even more if'n you keep spendin' time with her like that," Daryl said. He was failing here. He had no idea what he was supposed to say or what he was supposed to do. He thought it was good that Rick was showing some interest in the child, and he certainly didn't want it to be something he said or did that made him stop.

"It's alright, Daryl," Rick said. "I can't expect her to bond with me instantly. After all, I haven't exactly put forth any valiant effort during the rest of her life."

"Just do what'cha can, Rick," Daryl said.

Rick nodded. They were nearing the fields now.

"Better late than never, right?" Rick said.

Daryl responded with a nod of his own head. "Yeah, better late than never."

1111111111111111111111111111111111111111

"It feel so good to be out here," Carol said, dragging a bag over to Tyreese who loaded it in the back of the truck. She turned, going back to grab one of the other boxes and bags that they'd packed up.

"It's a nice day," Tyreese said, "but I'd just as soon be back behind the fences as soon as we can be." He grabbed one of the boxes and she grabbed up another sack.

"We got a lot, though," Carol said. "It was a good run."

"It was, you're right, and I think we got just about everything this orchard's got to offer up," Tyreese responded, loading his own box and taking the bag from Carol.

He followed her back, gathering up what was the last of it. He heaved his own load over the side of the truck and then took hers. Carol took one of the peaches out of one of the boxes, wiped it on her shirt, and took a bite of it.

"'ome 'ere," she said, trying to speak around the bite. She reached her hand up, grabbing at Tyreese's neck. He leaned into her and she kissed him, passing him part of the peach. He pulled away, chewing and swallowing it. She smiled at him, taking another bite, "'ant 'ore?" She asked. He smiled and pulled her to him, kissing her again and accepting the part of the bite that she flicked into his mouth with her tongue. He lingered there a moment before breaking apart from her to chew the fruit.

"We got everything," he said. "We should head back."

They'd seen very little activity during their run. A handful of Walkers along the sides of the roads. A couple roaming around amidst the overgrown orchard, and one or two that had sauntered up from nowhere while they were picking boxes, but nothing really worth raising an eyebrow over. It was getting later, though, and Tyreese couldn't really tell what time it was or how long they had before dusk. The sky hadn't begun to change color yet, but that didn't mean that time wasn't sneaking up on them.

Carol hooked her arm around his waist, pulling him back down to her. He kissed her again. She tasted like peaches. She tipped her head up at him and he licked the stick trail of juice that ran down her chin.

"We could stay a few more minutes," she said. Tyreese was a little amused looking at her. She was looking up with him with what he now knew was lust in her eyes. He waited a moment, leaned against the back of the truck, glancing around to make sure that there were no Walkers in the direct vicinity. He wondered how far Carol would go. The only time that she'd suggested they do anything since they'd been together had been the night that she'd been drunk, and he'd only refused her then, knowing that she'd be asleep in a matter of minutes.

"Are you suggesting something?" Tyreese asked.

Carol cocked an eyebrow at him and he tried to hide his smile. He just stood there, waiting.

"You know what I'm suggesting," Carol said.

"No," Tyreese said, still fighting back a smile. "No, I don't think I _do_, Carol. What exactly is it that you want? We've been here a few minutes already."

Tyreese watched a bit of a pout cross Carol's face.

"We could stay a few minutes and do something besides pick peaches," she said.

"We've been standing here not picking peaches," Tyreese countered. "You've got a half-eaten one in your hand."

Carol huffed. "That's not what I mean," she said, "and you know it."

"What did you mean, then?" Tyreese asked. He was finding it very difficult to fight his smile. She was growing frustrated, and he thought it was the cutest thing he'd ever seen. He wondered how long it would take for her to finally be driven to tell him what she was thinking. He glanced around again, checking to make sure that all was clear.

"Come on!" Carol said, obviously frustrated. "There's no one here. How often do we get to be alone? No Michonne, no Daryl, no kids, just me and you," she said.

"And that guy," Tyreese said, noticing a Walker ambling toward them.

Carol turned and walked toward the solitary Walker, grimacing before she drew her knife and stabbed it. As it dropped, she pulled her knife out, wiping it clean on the Walker and then returned it to her belt. She turned back toward Tyreese.

"_Now_ it's just you and me," Carol said.

"So?" Tyreese asked.

"So? _So_…" Carol said. She didn't say anything after that, but she did somewhat flap her arms at him out of frustration and he finally cracked and smiled, letting a chuckle escape him. Suddenly she looked a little mad. "You _know_ what I'm talking about, you're just being mean to me now," she said. He thought she might have said it a little louder than she'd meant to.

Tyreese stood there a minute, regarding her, wondering what she'd do next.

"I just wondered if you'd actually ask me for it, Carol," Tyreese said finally. "You know that you have just as much right as I do to suggest we have sex, right? That's what you want, isn't it?"

He was surprised when she almost looked like she was going to cry, her fists bunched at her side.

"Forget it," Carol said, starting around the truck like she was going to get in the passenger side. Tyreese realized he had pushed too far. He didn't understand why, but the fact remained that Carol just couldn't bring herself to tell him that's what she wanted. He rushed after her, catching her.

"Hold it, I'm sorry," he said, pulling her to him in a hug. He pushed her away after a second and kissed her. "I just hope that one day you'll feel like you can tell me what you want, but if you can't yet, that's fine."

Carol didn't respond to him, but she did look up at him. Now there were definitely tears glistening in her eyes.

"Hey," Tyreese said. "It's been such a nice day, don't start crying and mess it up for yourself, OK? Come on, let's get in the truck. It could be fun. I'd like to go parking with my girl."

Tyreese walked around and opened Carol's door on the truck. At least if they were inside the truck they were much more protected than they would be anywhere out here, and Tyreese didn't relish the thought of getting caught somewhere with their pants around their ankles. Carol got into the truck, and he was sorry. Her general nature right now was nothing like it had been while she was eating the peach earlier. He wished he hadn't pushed her. Now she just seemed upset.

Tyreese circled around the back of the truck after closing her door. He grabbed another peach out of one of the boxes and proceeded to crawl into the driver's side, closing the door.

"Boy you've really got your feelings hurt right now, don't you," he said, regarding Carol.

She didn't respond to him.

"I'm sorry, Carol," he said. "I was an ass. I shouldn't have pushed you. I know you were trying to do your best and you were outside of your comfort zone." Carol didn't respond to him, but he decided he was going to keep going. He wasn't going to just drop it. "I _liked_ that side of you, Carol. I wasn't trying to embarrass you or hurt your feelings. I just wanted _more_ of it."

Carol leaned her arm against the door, her face against the passenger side window. She wasn't responding and he wondered if she was too upset to respond. She'd never exactly explained to him why it was that she didn't like to admit that she wanted to have sex with him, but he knew there was a reason. It bothered him because it also seemed, sometimes, like she didn't like to admit that she enjoyed it afterwards. He felt bad now, wondering if it had something to do with Ed. Sometimes he got angry at the situation, realizing how much they had to work to overcome, just because of that asshole.

"Do you think you'd feel better if you just got it out?" Tyreese asked. Sometimes when she got like this he could urge her to cry it out and then after a few minutes she would be fine. "We don't have to do anything if you don't want to," he said finally, having waited for her response that never came. "I'm sorry, I just hope you forgive me."

Tyreese sighed. There was nothing he could do. He put the peach between them on the seat and reached up to crank the truck.

He stopped when Carol put her hand on his arm. She still looked a little like she was fighting back tears. He felt really bad. He wished he could go back in time and take it back. He wished he'd never hurt her feelings. More than anything, though, he wished he understood what it was that came over her when she was like this, and what he could do to undo whatever it was that Ed had obviously done to her.

Carol didn't say anything, but she did lean over and kiss him. When she pulled away, Tyreese smiled at her. He picked up the peach between them, bit it, and leaned over kissing her and pushing her down a little toward her side of the seat.

She accepted his tongue and the bite of peach and he felt her hands wandering underneath them. He backed off her and watched as she chewed the bite of the peach. She unfastened her jeans and picker herself up enough to push them down with her underwear. She leaned up to kiss him again and he unfastened his own pants. She wasn't going to say anything, and he'd already resolved himself not say anything else. If this was the best that she could do, it was still more than she'd once done, and it was the best invitation to christen this truck that he'd ever received.

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"So are we even now?" Michonne asked as she was putting Hope down. Carol was already in the nursery, sitting in the rocking chair, reading books to Judith by lamplight. Hope hadn't made it to story time, choosing instead to fall asleep on Daryl after a round of what Michonne referred to as "Daddy the Jungle Gym".

"I don't know what you're talking about," Carol said, closing the book that she'd just finished.

"You know what I'm talking about," Michonne said. She turned around, leaning gently against the side of Hope's crib.

"Alright, Jude, sleepy time," Carol said. She stood up and carried Judith over to Michonne so that she could give her goodnight kiss. Then Carol kissed the little girl and put her in her crib, handing her the duck that she always slept with.

"Daryl and I went off to the creek for a little alone time and we didn't tell you where we were going, and you and Tyreese slipped off to the orchard," Michonne said, a smirk on her face.

Carol turned around, half smiling.

"You didn't tell anyone where you were going," Carol said. "We told Maggie where we were going. We went to pick peaches for everyone."

Michonne smiled then. "Don't play innocent with me, Carol, I saw you adjusting your clothes for at least five minutes after you got out that truck. You might have picked peaches, but that wasn't all that happened while you were out."

Carol smiled then.

"We're even," she said after a minute. "Just do me a favor and the next time y'all go sneaking off together, at least tell someone where you're off to."

"I'll make a deal with you," Michonne said. "I'll tell you where we're going if you promise not to try to talk us out of it."

Carol paused a minute in front of her as though she were thinking it through.

"Mmmm…how about I agree not to try to talk you out of it as long as it's not too dangerous," Carol said. She cocked an eyebrow at Michonne.

Michonne nodded.

"Fine, same goes for you, though," Michonne said.

Carol smiled again.

"Deal. Goodnight, Michonne," she said, taking the lantern and starting out the nursery and toward her room where Tyreese was already in bed.

"Night, Peaches," Michonne said, snickering.


	86. Chapter 86

As Rick walked toward his house after breakfast, he noticed Sadie step out onto her porch. She hadn't come to breakfast. Instead Mark had been there with the baby. Now he realized that Sadie must have been sleeping in because she stepped out on the porch wearing nothing but a very oversized button down shirt and carrying a cup of coffee, despite the heat. She walked out on the porch, apparently oblivious to him passing in the street, and put the cup on the porch railing, stretching and moving her rocking chair to a different position before settling down in it. Rick realized that was the moment that she first noticed his presence.

Rick steered his steps toward her porch, stopping right before the steps.

"Good sleep?" Rick asked.

Sadie smiled at him.

"Good morning," she said. "You want some coffee?"

Rick decided she probably hadn't understood what he had said, but he took her invitation to coffee as an invitation to join her on the porch. He mounted the steps and walked around, sliding the second rocker close to her. He tried not to let his eyes trail too much to her bare legs or to her cleavage, which was visible because she hadn't bothered to button the shirt she was wearing very high.

"No, thank you," Rick said as he sat. "Where'd you get the hot water?"

"It's not too hot," Sadie said. "I put drinking water in the windowsill at night. It warms it enough," she explained.

Rick smiled at her.

"I saw that Mark has the baby," Rick said.

Sadie nodded.

"I was sleepy, but Paul wasn't. Mark offered to watch him for a while after I fed him this morning. Was he OK?" She asked.

"He looked fine," Rick said.

Rick realized that he had no idea what to say to Sadie right now. He had a million things going on in his mind, but nothing that he could use as a conversation topic. He really hadn't been much of a "ladies' man" in his youth. That position had always really belonged to Shane. Lori had been the first woman that he was really, truly interested in that had he had ever dated. They'd seemed to work together so well in the beginning. It was hard to figure out exactly why their marriage had begun to go sour. He'd thought about it, like he'd thought about so many things during the past few days, and all he could come up with was that it had been a lack of communication, a lack of time together. In the end that had really been the problem.

When the group had returned from Woodbury, bringing with them the survivors that would become part of their group, his connection with Rachel had been purely physical. He didn't remember any sort of courtship with her. It had simply been an animalistic connection, one that had taken place randomly in the watch tower. He'd suspected she was flirting with him and he'd leaned in close to her. He wasn't sure if he'd kissed her or she'd kissed him, they'd just connected. From there the relationship had blossomed into something that was based entirely on sex. There wasn't a need for communication or conversation. He couldn't think of one meaningful conversation they'd had since they'd been together.

But Sadie was going to be different. If he was going to try to connect with her, he was going to have to do more than just lean in to kiss her, and she wasn't flirting with him. She was gorgeous, and she was driving him crazy by sitting so nonchalantly in front of him dressed the way that she was, seemingly unaware of his attraction to her, but she wasn't intentionally doing anything to draw his attention.

"I wanted to talk to you," he said, "about the conversation that we had the other day."

Sadie raised her eyebrows at him.

"Oh? What did you want to talk about?" Sadie asked.

"I really just wanted to say thank you," Rick said. "I've been spending a little time with Judith, and I'm glad that you put me in a situation where I had to."

"You didn't have to," Sadie said, "you _wanted_ to. I didn't do anything but push you in the right direction."

"Well, thank you anyway," Rick said.

"So, how are things with Judith?" Sadie asked.

Rick leaned back in the rocker that he was sitting in, looking out at the street for a moment. Finally he turned back, facing Sadie again, who apparently had not broken her line of sight with him.

"They're good, I guess," Rick said. "She seems fine with me, but I don't know what I expected to happen. I don't feel like her father, I feel like an outsider."

"Things will get better. She will understand when she's older, you'll just have to explain it to her. At least you found good parents for her," Sadie said.

Rick nodded. He'd already decided that at best he could hope to be some kind of uncle figure for Judith, but he hoped that he could at least have that kind of relationship with her. Carol and Tyreese were her parents, Judith had made that much clear, and he wasn't going to do anything to jeopardize the security that Judith found with them. He did wonder, though, if Judith would ever _understand_ the situation, no matter how they explained it, when he wasn't sure that any of them understood it entirely.

They sat there a moment longer, in silence. Rick had no idea what to say, and apparently Sadie either had nothing to say, or had no desire to chat. She sat quietly, sipping her coffee, and staring out at the people who passed by.

Daryl and Tyreese passed by a few minutes later. Daryl stopped just in front of Sadie's house and Tyreese paused a second later, stopping only inches behind Daryl.

"We goin' ta get a bed for Judith that Carol seen in Beth and Josh's house. We gotta take it back down to our house. Give us a hand?" Daryl called to Rick.

"Uh, sure," Rick said. He turned and noticed that Sadie was already looking at him, perhaps expecting an explanation about what was taking place.

"I'm going to go," Rick said. "They need help moving a bed for Judith," he explained.

Sadie smiled and nodded at him.

Rick got up and circled around behind her chair, starting toward the steps. He heard Sadie call "goodbye" to him as he dismounted the steps and he stopped to wave at her before joining up with Daryl and Tyreese.

111111111111111111111111111111111111111111

"Nooo!" Judith wailed. "My crib!" She pointed at her crib.

Michonne sighed. She and Carol had gotten their laughter this afternoon by watching the men trying to get the bed in the room and set up, making room somehow for the furniture that was already in the nursery. The plan was to introduce Judith to her new toddler bed, leaving her crib available in the future for the baby. They'd decided that it didn't matter that the room was crowded, since the children didn't use the room except for sleep, and the kids might as well be as used to living in tight quarters as the rest of them had been at times since this whole thing started.

Judith wasn't fond of the idea of her new bed now that it was bedtime, though. Carol was sitting in the floor, crowded in, next to the toddler bed. Judith was standing in front of her. At intervals she paced back and forth between the unwanted bed and her crib. Other times she clung to Carol trying to climb into her lap.

"Judith, you'll like your bed better," Carol argued. "It's comfortable and it's just like my bed."

She'd put Judith on the bed once, but the girl had almost acted like it was made of hot lava, scrambling off it as quickly as possible.

"My crib!" Judith protested, pointing back at her crib. To make her situation even more unbearable, Carol had put her duck on the bed, closest to the wall, and Judith kept eyeing it as though it were suffering some horrible fate.

Michonne watched them, leaning against Hope's crib. Hope was supposed to be sleeping, but instead she was standing in her crib, grasping the bars, and watching the brutal torture that Judith was obviously being subjected to.

"I'm getting too old for this," Carol said. Michonne snickered.

"Maybe she's just not ready for it," Michonne said. "We've got a good while before the baby comes, she could stay in her crib a little longer."

"No," Carol argued, "she's got to get used to the fact that things change, Michonne. This isn't a world where we can hide that from them. Better she learn that trauma over something as simple as a bed instead of something like losing me or Tyreese."

Michonne grunted her understanding. It was a hard truth, but it was the truth nonetheless. Michonne thought it was interesting to watch the children growing up now. Sometimes they seemed so different than children had before, but in other ways they remained pretty much the same.

"That's not your crib anymore, Jude, that's for babies. Cribs are for babies and beds are for big girls," Carol argued. "And you're a big girl, aren't you? Just like when you go potty, right? You're a big girl."

Judith eyed her, still obviously not wholly convinced.

"It's my crib," Judith argued back.

"Jude," Carol said, "this is your bed now. You're going to like it. That crib we're going to give to the baby. Can you be a big girl and give your crib to the baby?"

Judith's fingers went to her mouth immediately. Michonne knew that was a habit that they were going to have to break her of, but with working with potty training and now having a new bed, she noticed that Carol was making no move to address her compulsive finger sucking tonight.

"Baby?" Judith asked. "Baby Paul?"

"No, not Paul," Carol said. "Michonne's baby. Michonne has a baby in her belly, and when that baby gets here, it's going to need the crib. Can you let the baby have your crib?"

Judith's attention turned to Michonne then and Michonne snickered. She knew well and good that Judith had lost all interest whatsoever in the crib at this moment. Now her interest was entirely on the baby.

"I think you just blew her mind," Michonne said. Carol snickered.

"Come here, Michonne, sit down here with us," Carol said.

Michonne sighed.

"I might sit down there, but I'm not so sure how gracefully I'm going to get up," she said.

"I won't laugh, I remember how awkward it can be," Carol said.

Michonne eased herself down, finally making it all the way to the floor in the tight space and moving as close to Carol and Judith as she could.

"Is the baby kicking, by chance?" Carol asked.

"Actually, yes, the baby _is_ kicking," Michonne responded. "I'm guessing that little bout of activity stirred it up."

"Come here, Jude, do you want to feel the baby?" Carol asked.

Judith sucked her fingers and considered it a second. Finally she nodded, choosing to remain silent about the situation.

"Here, do this," Carol said, reaching out and putting her hand on Michonne's belly. Judith copied her, leaning around Michonne's legs. Michonne took the little girl's hand and pressed her hand against where the baby was kicking. Judith immediately snatched her hand away and rushed back to Carol, wrapping her arms around her and eyeing Michonne suspiciously.

Carol laughed.

"Congratulations, Carol, I think she's terrified of me now," Michonne said.

"No she's not!" Carol said. "You're not scared of the baby, are you Jude?" She asked, brushing the girl's hair back from her face.

Judith shook her head but didn't look away from Michonne.

"That's the baby moving in there. It's saying hello," Carol said. "Can you be a really big girl and give the baby your crib so that it's ready for the baby when it gets here?"

Judith considered it for a minute. Then slowly she'd let go of Carol, still regarding Michonne, but still not speaking. She moved forward, then, toward Michonne, reaching her hand out like she wanted to touch her belly again.

"The baby went to sleep," Michonne said. "It's not moving around right now," Michonne tried to explain when Judith had stepped in front of her legs, putting both her hands on her belly. "It's really sleepy. Are you sleepy too, Jude?"

Judith looked at her a minute like she was a little frightened.

"Carol, do you think she thinks I A-T-E the baby?" Michonne asked, spelling the word in order to not put any ideas in the mind of the girl that she hadn't established on her own.

"I don't know, who knows what she's thinking. I never had to explain that to Sophia," Carol said.

"I never had to explain it to my girls. They were too close together. I'm just afraid we've just scarred her," Michonne said.

She waited a minute. Judith had moved her hands off of her belly now, but she was still staring at her.

"Hey, Jude, you're not scared of me and the baby, are you?" Michonne asked.

Judith slowly shook her head.

"Can I have a hug, then?" Michonne asked. She held her arms out to Judith, wondering if the girl would respond as positively to her as she normally did. She was relieved when Judith reached her arms out to her. Michonne pulled her close to her, hugging her, and then letting her sit on her leg. "That's my girl. Can you give your big girl bed a try? I bet it's really comfy and your Daddy and your uncle Daryl and Rick, they all went through a lot of work just to get your special bed ready. Can you try to sleep in it?"

Michonne felt Judith snuggling against her. One of her hands had found one of Michonne's dreadlocks and she was twisting it.

"She's trying to go to sleep," Carol said. "Should I just let her go to sleep on you and then put her to bed?"

"It could work," Michonne replied.

They waited, together in the lamplight, until Judith had fallen asleep. Once she was out, Carol carefully got up and moved Judith into her bed, tucking her in with her duck. The girl was a good sleeper, and once she was out, she normally wasn't easily awakened.

"Finally," Carol whispered. She reached down and Michonne accepted her help, struggling to her feet. She checked on Hope, who had finally decided to go to sleep when things quieted down with Judith. "Hopefully she'll sleep fine in there, it really is more comfortable than the crib," Carol whispered as they were going out the door.

"Well, we won the battle," Michonne said, "let's just hope we haven't lost the war."

They bid each other goodnight in the hallway and Michonne slipped through the darkness into her own bedroom while Carol took the lamp, heading in the direction of her own.

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Michonne slipped into bed, the lamp on the bedside table was still burning and she leaned up and blew it out before sinking into her pillow. Daryl wrapped his arm protectively around her, like he did most nights, and his hand instinctively went for her belly.

"Y'all sure did have some rounds with Jude tonight," Daryl said.

"I thought you were asleep," Michonne said.

"Nah, 'Chonne, you know I don't like to sleep without ya, I knew you was comin' ta bed as soon as Jude gave up the fight," Daryl said. "You reckon she's gon' learn to like her new bed?"

"She'll learn to like it, Daryl, it's just something new for her," Michonne said.

"She ain't gon' like it none if we have to go on the road again," Daryl said. "Then all she gets for a bed is a hay pallet in some old barn if she's lucky."

Michonne thought about how matter-of-factly Daryl had made the statement. Life on the road was something that was a stark reality and a harsh memory for most of them, but it almost seemed distant at the same time.

Michonne didn't want to think about going back to life on the road right now. It was something that loomed over their heads, in the distance, and it made her uncomfortable. She curled herself up a little.

"What's wrong, 'Chonne? You feelin' OK?" Daryl asked.

She realized that she was tense and he must be responding to it. She tried to will herself to relax, but she doubted she'd been very successful.

"I was just thinking about going back on the road, Daryl," Michonne said. "I was just thinking that I wasn't ready to do it."

"You ain't gotta worry 'bout that right now, 'Chonne," Daryl said, squeezing her gently to him. "We ain't goin' no time soon. Carol said she done put up a lotta food an' she said she bets she'll get a year's worth of food easy. That don't even count what we got put up an' what we can still find. We stayin' put for a while."

"I know, Daryl, but it still worries me sometimes," Michonne admitted.

"I didn't mean to get ya stirred up, 'Chonne," Daryl said. "I was just talkin'. Forget I said it."

Michonne tried to relax. She felt Daryl pull away from her and minute later she felt his hands kneading into her back and squeezing at her shoulders. He was no masseuse, but he tried, and it felt good. She felt herself growing calmer and more relaxed.

"We may have scared Judith," Michonne said.

"How'dya do that?" Daryl asked, still kneading.

"We told her about the baby," Michonne said. She yawned.

"Why would she be scared of the baby?" Daryl asked.

"That's a lot for a little kid," Michonne said. "It can be hard for them to understand."

"She'll be fine, 'Chonne," Daryl said after a second. "Jude's a smart kid. We'll straighten her out if'n she thinks it's somethin' to be scared of."

Daryl continued kneading for a bit and Michonne felt herself drifting off. Finally, when he stopped and snuggled next to her again, his arm going around her, she felt him kiss her gently on the back of the neck.

"Speakin' of the baby, 'Chonne," he whispered. "Need ta get'cha some sleep so the baby can get some too. I love you, 'Chonne."

"I love you too," Michonne whispered back, just before she drifted off.


	87. Chapter 87

"We need to talk," Rick said, sitting on the bed.

Rachel regarded him a moment, but she didn't have to even wonder what he wanted to talk about. The thing with Rick was that he never wanted to talk about anything. Things had been changing, though, for both of them and she'd known this was coming. She had the suspicion that everyone knew it was coming. She wasn't unaware that the others were talking about them. She'd overheard them, and she couldn't blame them.

Rick wanted to talk about their relationship, or honestly the lack thereof. When Rachel had first joined the group, she'd felt out of place. She hadn't really known where she'd belonged. Everyone had seemed pretty tight with only a few people who even seemed to register somewhat as outsiders. Things had been different in Woodbury. In Woodbury there had been more people, and that mean that though everyone knew each other, it was just that they knew each other in name. They didn't spend as much time together and they surely didn't get as intimate as people in what was her new group seemed.

Rachel had figured that her only way "in" was getting with someone in the group, and it hadn't been a plan that she was against. She'd been alone a long time and she'd appreciated greatly the thought of some male companion, even if it was for warming her bed and nothing more.

At first she'd been attracted to Daryl, though she'd thought he was with Carol when she arrived. He'd been difficult too, hard to crack. She had decided quickly that if she were to even try to get close to him it would require much more effort than she intended to sink into such a relationship. He had a nice body, and that was really what she had been after, but it wasn't nice enough for all that seemed to come with it.

Rick had been another story, though. He had baggage, that much was obvious. He had a son, and though she wasn't entirely keen on the idea of gaining a child during the insanity that was around them, she'd decided she could tolerate Carl until they lost him, or until he'd found something of interest that drew him out from under his father. To date, however, she didn't feel that way about the boy. Now she saw him as the pretty independent child that he was. He hadn't asked her to mother him in any way. Instead he'd done well by himself, gathering whatever parenting he seemed to need from the group. He hadn't bothered her at all, and she'd grown quite fond of him, though she had no maternal feelings toward him.

Rick had Judith as well, but his connection with her had been so nonexistent that Rachel had only learned the child was his after someone else had pointed it out.

Even though they'd been together as long as they had, she still didn't quite know the details surrounding the situation, and she hadn't pressed Rick for more information. He had never seemed willing to offer it, and she had never felt like she desired to go pressing for it.

What she had known when she got involved with him was all she needed. He was essentially in charge of the group at the time, which was the closest one came to being a man in a uniform these days, and he had a sexual interest in her with very little desire to talk about any of the complicated things like feelings or situations. She didn't want to discuss hers, and he didn't want to discuss his, and together they'd found the release of physical tension.

Now he wanted to talk about things.

"What do you want to talk about?" Rachel asked, pretending she didn't already know.

"What does this relationship mean to you?" Rick asked.

Rachel didn't know if she wanted to answer him honestly. At this point it meant very little. She slept with him when one of them wanted release. They shared a bed. Other than that it meant little. Seth was getting a little better and his wound didn't seem nearly as serious as it had just after the battle. His sense of humor was attractive, not to mention his body. She'd connected more with him since he'd come to the community than she had with Rick in all the time they'd been bunking together.

She also wasn't a fool. She heard gossip about his interest in Sadie and she could see the way he regarded the woman. She held no grudges there. She doubted that Sadie even knew that Rick was interested, or that she had much knowledge of the train wreck of a man that was interested in her.

"What do you mean, Rick? What does it mean to you?" She responded.

She wondered if he'd even answer. Already that question was more intimate than most anything they'd discussed in their time together.

"I don't know if there's anything between us," Rick ventured after a few moments of silence.

Rachel took a seat on the bed beside him, then.

"Rick, I don't know what to say," she said. "I don't think there's ever been much between us, I mean besides sex."

Rick looked at her then, a little surprised. Rachel wondered, trying to hide her amusement, if he'd thought she was unaware of what had been going on all this time. He'd been a good fuck to her, but that had been all. Now he was looking her like he had expected her world to come crashing down around her because he was busy searching for some manner of breaking up with her. She hated to tell him that she'd suffered far worse from break ups in the past than she ever could by the end of whatever kind of system they'd developed.

"I think," Rick said, taking a second between words, "I think that we're not right for each other. I think that you need something different."

Rachel tried to hold back her amusement again.

"And you? What do you need?" She asked. He was trying so hard to cut her loose, but what was funny was that he didn't realize at all that there really wasn't much to be done there. She'd not expected this to last. It wasn't like for a moment she'd thought this was some big ordeal.

In the beginning she'd been smitten by his good looks and his body, but that was about it. She'd been protective of him, fearful that Michonne might make some kind of move on him, or one of the younger unattached women like Beth or Sasha. She'd tried to mark her territory clearly, that was for sure, but it was only because the pickings were slim. These days if there was something good on the shelf you had to grab it and hold on to it because it seemed like everybody wanted it. Whether or not she'd just considered him something for her sexual release, he'd been hers and she hadn't wanted anyone near him.

Now he was trying to cut her loose and she'd been struggling for a bit trying to figure out how to do the same to him.

"I don't know what I need," Rick responded after a minute. "I just think that we're not right for one another. I don't know…I don't think…" he paused, obviously trying to figure out how he wanted to venture forward with his speech. "I don't think that we're right, I don't think we work together."

"You mean that you've found someone new," Rachel said.

Rick looked at her again, a look of surprise registering on his face. This time Rachel didn't try to hide her smile.

"It's fine, Rick, really it is," she said. "I didn't know how to tell you, but I've gotten involved with Seth."

The surprised look continued.

"Not physically involved," Rachel said, "at least not yet, but emotionally involved. I know about his wife, Rick. We've talked about their child, how he lost them. He knows about me, and about the fact that I didn't want children. He knows about my husband."

"You were married?" Rick asked.

Rachel smiled again.

"I was, but you didn't know that. I know your wife's name, Rick, I know about your story, but I didn't hear it from you. I heard Seth's story from Seth, and I told him mine. It's a whole different type of relationship when someone knows your story," Rachel said.

"You're not upset, then?" Rick asked.

"Upset? No, I'm not upset, are you?" Rachel asked.

Rick pinched the bridge of his nose. That was answer enough for her. At this point they may not be romantically interested in each other, and they may not have shared many of their emotions, but Rachel had learned to read the man through trial and error to some degree.

"It's fine, Rick, these things happen," she offered.

"I just don't know what we do now," Rick said after a minute.

Rachel shrugged.

"We weren't married, Rick, and I don't have any hard feelings. I have a few things here and it's late. I'll sleep here tonight and tomorrow we'll pack up what I have to take with me and I'll move into an extra room at Seth's house. The rest doesn't matter. You'll do what you need to do and I'll do what I need to do," Rachel said.

"What about Carl," Rick asked, "should we talk to him?"

"I think he'll understand," Rachel said, "but if he doesn't I'll just be a couple of houses away. It isn't like we can exactly move away from one another."

"What do we do after this?" Rick asked.

"We do what we need to do," Rachel answered. "You do what you need to do and I'll do what I need to do. We can still be friends, Rick. I'm not hurt by this. In fact, I think it's better. I'm going to get closer to someone who wants me, Rick, who really wants to know me. I hope you can find that. Either way, I'm not going to be bitter about this. I think we're beyond that now."

Rick seemed somewhat in shock at what she was saying and Rachel smiled. She could understand his confusion or at least his momentary setback. This wasn't how a typical break up would work. She knew that. Maybe he'd expected her to cry or throw something, but she really didn't feel moved in the slightest.

"Let's sleep now," she offered. "Tomorrow you'll help me move my things and that will be that," she said bluntly. "I'll thank you for the good times and you'll thank me, and we'll move on. We'll just change the way the relationship works a little."

Rick sat silently on the side of the bed for a few minutes. He didn't say anything after that, and Rachel didn't pressure him to do so. Their relationship so far hadn't been built off of words and there was no reason to think that things should change now that they were admitting to themselves that whatever they'd had together had run its course. Now was the time for sleeping and tomorrow would begin a new day, and a new chapter, hopefully, for each of them.

Rachel crawled into bed and blew out the lamp. The room went dark and she tried to sleep, aware that Rick was still working through things as he often did. He'd come to bed when he was ready. She also realized, as she pulled the blanket around her shoulder, that tonight was the last night that she'd spend alone beside him. She would have thought, perhaps once upon a time, that she'd be upset, but she was actually surprised to find herself excited by the prospect of embarking on a new chapter to her life.

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Carol was filling ration boxes when Mark came into the storage house, dropping another ration box on the floor. He was carrying Paul.

"There you are," Carol said. "I thought I'd lost you for a bit."

"It's hard to get lost around here," Mark said. "I had to go and find Sadie. This little guy was hungry and now he's showing no interest in napping."

Carol smiled at the baby he had cradled in one arm.

"You know I could make that easier for you, if you're interested," she said.

"Anything that makes life easier interests me," Mark said.

"Come on, let's go see what we've got upstairs. We found quite a few wraps while we were cleaning things out," Carol said. Mark followed her up the stairs of the storage house and waited patiently while she fumbled through boxes. She finally came up with what she was looking for. "OK, what's his preferred position when he's just hanging out?"

"I guess like this," Mark said. "He hasn't really started making requests, but he doesn't get fussy when he's like this and he can fall asleep when he's ready."

"Good deal," Carol said. "These things are great. I'll just wrap him up to you and then you're hands free. You don't mind, do you? It's awkward at first, but you get used to it quickly. I know it embarrassed Daryl at first when we made him wear Hope around, but he got used to it."

"I'm pretty secure in my masculinity," Mark responded. "Wrap me up!"

Carol smiled and proceeded to manipulate the wrap while Mark held the baby in place. It took longer than some of the positions that she'd wrapped Hope in before, but finally she felt like the baby was secure enough for any of Mark's activities.

"Feel alright?" She asked once they'd let the baby settle gently into place.

"Feels pretty good. It's like a big hug," Mark said smiling.

"Shall we get back to work?" Carol asked, starting back downstairs. She wanted to get ration boxes done as quickly as possible. Mark had brought her almost all of them after he'd finished taking jars of canned food over to the second storage house that they'd established. As Carol was filling ration boxes, Michonne was passing back and forth returning them to their houses.

Mark nodded and followed Carol back to the filling area.

"How did things look out there? Anybody bored?" Carol asked. Between the fields, the canning, the water runs, finishing setting up the second storage house, and handling the demolition on one of the houses they were tearing down, Carol couldn't imagine that anyone was busy. That wasn't even considering the day to day domestic chores that she had to make sure were coordinated.

"I didn't see anyone looking bored," Mark said, beginning to drop shampoo bottles into a few of the boxes. "I did see something interesting, though."

"What is that?" Carol asked.

"Well, don't quote me on this, but it looks like our little Miss Rachel might be moving. I saw Rick helping her carry some stuff over to Seth's house," Mark said.

Carol stopped what she was doing and raised her eyebrows at the man.

"Were they fighting?" Carol asked.

"No, no fighting. Looked to me like they were getting along, helping each other out," Mark replied.

Carol smiled.

"Our first break up," Carol said. "It seems strange."

"Why does it seem strange? I don't know how your life went, but I saw plenty of people who split before all this happened, so I don't suppose that it would be any different now. Sometimes it works out, and sometimes it doesn't," Mark said.

Michonne passed in the door. She picked up one of the water jugs they kept by the door and took a swig out of it. Both Carol and Mark turned to look at her.

"What?" Michonne asked. "Did I miss something? Is there something wrong with the water?"

Carol smiled.

"No, there's nothing wrong. We were just chatting," Carol responded.

"You mean you were gossiping," Michonne said, taking another swallow of the water. "I know it wasn't about me because I don't have any secrets."

"It was about Rick and Rachel," Mark said. "Looks like Rachel is relocating. We were just talking about break ups at the end of the world."

"Apparently they still exist," Carol said.

"Well they're not screaming at each other and throwing things," Michonne said, "otherwise everyone would have known about it by now, so I guess it doesn't really matter. Let them do what they want."

She returned the water to its place and without saying anything else took one of the boxes that Carol had pushed into the pile to be returned to its owner.

"I guess this means that Rachel's box isn't going to Rick's house anymore?" Michonne asked. "Where do I put it?" She asked, reading Rachel's name on the side of the cardboard.

"I'd take it to Seth's house," Mark responded. "That would be the best bet."

Michonne shrugged and started out the door with the box.

"I guess relationships have changed, but not entirely," Carol said.

"Some things never change," Mark said.

"What about you, Mark? What's your story?" Carol asked.

Mark continued traipsing back and forth, dropping various items into boxes and checking the list to see what he was missing.

"My story? Do you mean my story before all this, or do you mean how did I end up in the woods with Sadie?" Mark asked.

"Well, both," Carol said. "I mean I don't know much about you. You owned a furniture store, you volunteered as an EMT, you moonlighted apparently as a stylist and fashion consultant. What else is there that you can tell me?"

"You know, I don't know that much about you, either," Mark said. "I could turn the tables on you and ask you to recount your story."

"Mine's quick enough," Carol said. "My life before all this wasn't anything great. I had an abusive husband, and I got to put a pickaxe through his brain after a bunch of Walkers turned him into an ugly accident. I had a precious little girl…" Carol stopped a moment and then regained herself, smiling at Mark. "Sophia…she was my heart. We lost her."

Mark stopped what he was doing a moment.

"I knew you'd lost a child. I'm sorry to hear that. I didn't have children, but I know that it's hard," Mark said.

"It's hard," Carol said, "but it's not as hard as it was at one time. It doesn't hurt any less, but it hurts…I don't know…_differently_."

"I can understand that," Mark said.

"Since then I've been pretty much what you see now. I thought I'd end up with Daryl, but I didn't. I didn't know I'd end up with Judith, but I did. I guess Daryl and Michonne sort of adopted me when we

"And what I see is impressive," Mark said. Carol smiled at him. She really liked Mark, and every day that she was around him the more she liked him. The best thing about him was that he was so at home with everyone. He was the kind of person who didn't seem to ever meet a stranger.

Mark sighed.

"I don't have much of a story, I really don't. I had a great family life. Some friends introduced me to my partner, Vince, when we were both in college. He worked in real estate and he was great at his job. He could sell anything," Mark smiled.

Carol watched him a minute, worried that pressing into his life before might be difficult for him, but he actually looked right this moment like he was happy.

"Don't get me wrong," Mark said, "we were together a long time and I'm not going to pretend that Vince and I didn't have our problems, but we were happy for the most part. Before all this happened we joked about adopting some little foreign kids, maybe some Chinese little girls. You know, a house full, Brangelina style."

"Well, you make a good father," Carol said, nodding her head toward the baby that she knew had to be asleep nestled next to his chest.

Michonne ducked in the door and Carol turned to look at her, as did Mark. She held up her hands.

"I'm not trying to interrupt, just getting a box," she said. "Just so you know, you were right about me taking the box to Seth's. Rachel gave me an earful about how she's taking the guest room there, just to see how things work out. Apparently she and Rick have finally realized they just aren't right for each other. I thought you two hens might want to know that." Michonne grabbed up another box, read the name on the side and started out the door without waiting for either of them to respond.

Carol looked back at Mark and he shrugged. She smiled.

"Where was I?" Mark asked.

"You were talking about your adoptive children," Carol said.

"Oh, right. So we never got around to adopting. We had this chocolate lab for about ten years, and we had this basset hound that smelled terrible. Seriously, I washed that dog nearly every day and even put this dog deodorizer on it. The thing always smelled like stinky dog with a hint of something floral," Mark said.

Carol snickered.

"Vince also had two really ornery old Siamese cats. They lived in our house, but I can't really say that we _had_ them, it was more that they let us live there," Mark said. "Cats can be that way."

Mark paused a few minutes, checking the contents of one or two of the boxes and then moving them closer to the door for Michonne when she returned.

"So when this whole thing started, the first thing we noticed was that the dogs disappeared, right out of the yard, but that wasn't anything too strange. The basset had a habit of digging out and they'd disappear a day or two and then they'd be back. Except they weren't back by the time the news started telling us that things were going crazy and we figured they were probably caught up in the madness," Mark continued when he came back to finish up the two boxes in front of him.

"When we left Atlanta we were with a group of friends. We all decided to try to get out together. Needless to say we were caught up in the panic, not organized at all. I think we ran pretty much head on into a herd of the Walker things. Vince didn't make it," Mark said.

Carol nodded. She'd already known that his partner had been lost in a Walker attack, and she realized there was really nothing left to say about it. It was clear that he had come to terms with it, he didn't sound emotional about it any longer. Time had a way of doing that to them, letting them move on from most of their losses to a point where they could talk about them with distance and without being overwhelmed with emotion.

"After that you pretty much know the story. I went with my group, rambling aimlessly really, and we joined up with another group. After that it was just travelling with the group, adding people, losing people, until the attacks started happening after we made camp close to here. I told you how I ended up with Sadie. The rest is history," Mark said. He shrugged and Carol watched him shift Paul a little.

"Is he OK?" Carol asked.

"He's fine. Is it normal that he sleeps a lot?" Mark asked.

Carol smiled. "He's really young, so he'll mostly sleep and eat for a while. Just wait until he gets older and you and Sadie have your hands full with him like we do with Hope and Judith."

"He'll be a good kid," Mark said. "He's already a good baby, or at least I guess he is."

"I think he is," Carol said. "So how does it work with you and Sadie? I've been curious about that."

"What do you mean how does it work?" Mark asked.

"I mean what is your relationship like? Are you just really good friends?" Carol asked.

"We've survived together," Mark answered. "I guess that gives us something. We're just friends, though. We don't have any kind of romantic relationship. Sadie takes care of Paul for the most part, but I like to help her out when I can, and I wake her up at night when he cries. It's kind of nice, really. We're just roommates."

Carol smiled.

"Once upon a time I think that we might have thought it was crazy to imagine spending the rest of your life just living with friends, but now it doesn't seem odd at all. In fact, these days I think I'd be much more lost not having Michonne and Daryl in the house than I ever would feel crowded sharing my space with them, I suppose that you're like that Sadie," Carol said.

"Oh, I think so," Mark said. "I don't know that there's another relationship for me or for Sadie in all this madness, but I like to think that if there were for either one of us, or for both of us, that we'd be like you guys are. I wouldn't want to just walk away from her, and I would hope that she wouldn't walk away from me."

Michonne came back in the door then, stopping again to get a drink of water.

"I don't think she would," Carol said. "After all, you've got a kid together now."

Mark smiled. "I think you're right," he said.

"Are these all the boxes?" Michonne asked, leaning against the wall.

"This is it," Carol said, standing up from her position, "but I can help you now. They're all ready to go. Mark, do you think you can check on the canning crew and make sure they have enough jars?"

"Sure thing," Mark said. "I'm going to go drop Paul off with Sadie and then I'll check on them. Do you still want everything they've got done in that other house?"

"I do. I'll organize it all later," Carol said.

She grabbed a box, waited for Michonne to pick up one of the remaining few, and she started out the door with Mark just behind them.

"Hey, Carol," Mark said, as the women descended the stairs and started off down the street.

"Yeah?" Carol asked, turning around.

"Thanks for the chat," Mark said, winking at her. Carol smiled at him. He turned quickly and started in the opposite direction, not waiting for any kind of response from her.

Carol saw Michonne shoot her a confused look. She just smiled at her and Michonne shrugged.


	88. Chapter 88

**AN: I'd like to apologize to the little piece missing from Carol's story in the previous chapter. My World Processor has a delightful way of randomly selecting pieces of the text while I'm writing and editing. (Probably owing to the very sensitive touchpad?) If I don't catch it, it deletes the text. I normally notice that this has happened and can fix it, but I must have missed that section. **

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Sadie had been down doing demolition work with some of the others. She finally excused herself, feeling disgusting. She had already brought down some water for a bath earlier and she knew it was waiting for her in her bedroom. Hopefully it was cool because she was burning up.

As she was walking down the street she felt a hand clamp onto her shoulder and she swung around, surprised to find Beau standing there, staring at her.

"Sorry I scared ya," Beau said. "Didn't mean ta do that."

Sadie smiled at him.

"It's OK," she said. "Do you need something?"

Beau smiled at her.

"Nah, I just figured I'd walk with ya, where ya headed?" He asked.

Sadie couldn't understand Beau all the time. She was dripping sweat, sick of her own scent, and she felt cruddy with the caked on dirt, sawdust, and dust in general that got stirred up while they were working on demolition. She couldn't imagine where she'd be going besides in search of a bath. Still, she realized that Beau was probably just trying to make conversation, and he was sometimes awkward at that when it came to starting one with her.

"Home," she said. "I need a bath. I smell terrible."

Beau shifted uncomfortably for a moment, looking Sadie over.

"Yeah, I hear ya," Beau said. "You want me to go down an' get Carol to warm ya up some bath water?"

Sadie shook her head.

"No, it's too hot. I've got water, it'll be fine," she said. He was a sweet boy, and she appreciated that he always wanted to do something for her, but the last thing she wanted in this heat was hot water to bathe with. She would have preferred ice water if that were possible.

"Oh," Beau said. He stood there a moment longer and then dropped his head, turning away. Sadie realized that she had hurt his feelings, which had not been her intention at all.

"Beau," Sadie called. The boy stopped and turned back.

"Yeah?" He asked.

Sadie smiled at him, trying to let him know that she hadn't meant to hurt his feelings in any way.

"Thank you anyway," she said.

Beau smiled back at her.

"No problem, you wanna walk with me?" He asked. Sadie smiled, nodded, and trotted forward to catch up with him.

They walked in silence until they got to Sadie's porch. Sadie mounted the steps and turned back to Beau.

"Um…thank you for walking with me," Sadie said. "I'm going to take a bath now."

Beau lingered at the bottom a moment, holding to the post and looking at Sadie. She wasn't sure what he was waiting for or what he was going to do. She smiled again, shrugging a little, and turned toward her door, anxious to wash off.

"Wait," Beau said. "I got somethin' for ya." The boy bounded up the steps and was suddenly just in front of her. "Hold out yer hand."

Sadie wondered what Beau was up to. This wasn't exactly the kind of society any longer where people gave each other gifts. There wasn't much use in that. If they wanted anything from one of the other houses, the simply took it. Still, she held her hand out. Beau dug awkwardly in his pocket for a moment and came out with something that he put into her palm.

Sadie turned the figure over, examining it. It was a small wooden giraffe, polished and smooth. She turned it over and over in her hand for a moment, not entirely understanding why he had given it to her.

"It's a giraffe," Beau said when she looked at him. "At least it's the best I could make. It's a lot better than the other two were. I sanded it down fer ya, so it ain't got no rough sides ner nothin'. You won't get no splinters."

Sadie examined the wooden figure, turning it over in her hands again. She realized now that he had made the little giraffe, and had apparently put a great deal of effort into it. She wasn't sure how to react. She thought it was a precious gift, but she worried a little about what Beau had intended the animal to mean.

"It's beautiful," Sadie said. "You did very good." She smiled at him. She started to hand him the giraffe back, wondering if maybe she'd misunderstood. Maybe he was just showing her the little animal instead of actually _giving_ it to her. Maybe he just wanted to prove that he could make a tiny giraffe if he wanted.

"No! I made it for you," Beau said. "It's yours."

"Oh…thank you," Sadie said. She realized now that it was a gift. She looked down at it again, considering it and considering what she wanted to say to the boy. When she looked back at Beau, she was surprised when his lips came crashing roughly into hers, his hand suddenly tangled in her hair, pulling her mouth to him. She felt him probing her lips with his tongue, and his teeth scratched at her lips. Sadie struggled away from him, finally succeeding in separating them.

For a moment she stood there, unsure of what to say. Beau looked embarrassed, but he didn't move.

"What was that?" Sadie asked, trying not to look angry. She didn't want to frighten the boy, but she knew now that she was going to have to set him straight about the situation.

"I was…" Beau started. "I was just kissin' ya, but ya didn't let me finish."

Sadie took a deep breath and then sighed. Beau looked like he was getting ready to move in for another kiss, and she put her hands up, catching him on the shoulders.

"No," she said. "I like you, Beau."

Beau smiled a little awkwardly.

"I like you too!" He said.

Sadie shook her head and his face fell a little.

"I mean I like you as a friend," Sadie said. "I like you like I like Mark. I like you like I like Michonne. I like to be friends with you, Beau, and I want us to be friends, but I don't want to be your girlfriend. I don't want you to kiss me."

Beau looked a little crushed and Sadie felt sorry for it.

"But I like you," Beau protested.

"Why?" Sadie asked Beau. "Why do you like me? What do you like about me?"

Beau shrugged and shifted his feet. Sadie reached out, putting her hand under his chin and tipping his face toward her again.

"I don't know. You're nice, and you're pretty," Beau said.

Sadie smiled.

"And you're a handsome young man, with a great personality. That's why we should be friends, but there's so much more, Beau, so much you haven't thought about. I have a baby now. Mark is a big part of my life. There's so much you don't know about me. I care about you, but not the way that you want me to. You'll find someone though, your own age, and you'll be happy with her," Sadie said.

"Them girls don't even pay me no attention," Beau said.

Sadie smiled at him again.

"Maybe it's because you haven't paid them any attention," Sadie said. "If you show them who you are, how wonderful you are, I bet you that they'd like you, and they _would _want to kiss you."

Beau nodded, but he still didn't look happy. Sadie hoped that he'd get over that, but she understood that he'd need a few minutes from being let down.

"Yeah, fine," Beau said finally. "I gotta go."

Sadie smiled. She reached up and ran her fingers through his hair. She kissed him gently on the cheek. He looked at her a minute and smiled a crooked little smile. She held her hand up, offering him back the giraffe.

"No, ya gotta keep that. I made it fer ya, ain't for nobody else," he said.

"Thank you, Beau," Sadie said. "Are we still friends?" She asked.

Beau stood there for a moment, staring at her. Finally he nodded.

"Yeah, Sadie, we're still friends," Beau said.

Sadie smiled.

"Good. See you later?"

Beau smiled back.

"See ya at dinner," he said. He turned and bounded off the steps. Sadie watched him start down the street before she opened her hand and looked at the giraffe again. She smiled and ducked into the house for the bath that she'd been planning, hoping that Beau wasn't too upset.

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"Da Da!" Tyreese was walking toward headquarters in hopes of dinner soon when he was attacked by Judith. "Da Da, come here," she said. She came running toward him, almost stumbling, and grabbed his leg.

"Where are we going?" He asked, reaching a finger down for her to grab. He shot a look at Carol who was finishing up dinner. She looked up at him momentarily, shrugged, and went back to stirring whatever was in the pot.

"Come on," Judith whined.

"Ok, fine Jude, I'm coming," Tyreese said. He let her pull him to their yard. She went directly to their little pool in the shade, emptied of water for the time being. Tyreese stood there and watched as she reached into the pool and fished out one of the toys they had piled there.

"Look, boat!" Judith said, holding up a plastic boat.

"I see, Jude, you have a boat," Tyreese said.

Suddenly the little girl started tugging at her clothes. She was out of her shirt before Tyreese realized what she was doing and she pushed her shorts down quickly. She would have been out of them if it hadn't been for the fact that getting them over her shoes was a puzzle she hadn't solved yet.

"Judith!" Tyreese said loudly. "Don't take your clothes off!"

From a few feet away he could hear Carol laughing. He realized she had set him up for this, whatever it was.

"No clothes, I swim," Judith protested.

"We're going to put your clothes back on, Judith," Tyreese said, coming over and pulling her shorts back up and reaching around her to find her shirt.

Judith stood there, her fingers in her mouth, looking crushed.

"No…" she whined. "I swim, no clothes!"

"Now isn't swimming time, it's eating time," Tyreese said, pulling her shirt on, momentarily dislodging her fingers from her mouth. He almost laughed at how crushed she looked. He put her arm through the other sleeve boat and all. "Can you put your boat back in the pool?"

Judith eyed him with the same expression she gave him whenever he scolded her for something. It was something between betrayal and dislike. Her bottom lip curled out now that she'd removed her fingers.

"I want to swim," she protested again. Tyreese raised his eyebrows at her and she edged slowly toward the pool, dropping the boat reluctantly over the side and standing there, looking betrayed. He wondered for a moment if Carol had told her that he would take her swimming, but he thought he would have been warned if such an activity had been promised. "Please?" Judith asked after a minute. Tyreese sighed.

"No, Jude, it's not swimming time. You have to eat," he said, scooping her up. She turned her face away from him. He started back toward headquarters. "I tell you what," he said, "if you eat good, I'll bring you out here to swim a little before bed. Would you like that? You and Hope can swim a little? You can take your bath in the pool?"

Judith seemed to be considering it a minute and then she grinned at him.

"You like that?" He asked.

"OK!" Judith said, still grinning.

Tyreese was coming up near Carol who was wrestling up one of the pots.

"Trade with me," Tyreese said. Carol sat the pot down and took Judith. Tyreese heaved up the pot. "You set me up," he said.

Carol laughed. "I did not set you up. I don't know what happened with you and Judith, but she did that all on her own. I did hear enough though that I want to thank you for volunteering to bathe the girls. I'll get Michonne to bring the soap and towels down to you after dinner. Now if she can just convince Daryl to read the stories tonight, we may get a night off."

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"Did Judith go to sleep?" Carol asked when Tyreese came in the room. She dog eared the page of the book she was reading and put it on the bedside table.

"Yeah, she's out. I think she was really tired," Tyreese said. "Hope didn't put up much of a fight for Daryl either."

Carol flipped back the cover and Tyreese shucked off his clothes, climbing in beside her.

"She had a busy day," Carol said, resting her head on Tyreese's chest.

"Rick came by earlier, while I was washing the girls outside," Tyreese said. "I asked him if he wanted to help, but he said no. He just watched a few minutes and then went on home."

Carol ran her finger around Tyreese's chest and leaned up on her elbow to look at him.

"So?" She asked.

"I don't know," Tyreese said. "Sometimes I just feel bad for Rick. I feel guilty, I guess."

"What do you have to feel guilty about?" Carol asked. Tyreese looked at her face. She looked thoroughly confused.

"I just try to think how I'd feel if I were Rick and some strange man was masquerading as the father of my child and I was just on the _outside_, you know? I was trying to be some kind of _uncle_ to my kid while this complete stranger was taking my place," Tyreese said.

Carol smiled at him and kissed him.

"You've got nothing to feel guilty about. Rick's told you that he appreciates the role you play in Judith's life," she said.

"I just feel bad because I think I'd feel terrible if I were him," Tyreese argued.

"Maybe _you_ would, but you're not Rick. You've already been a single dad once, right?" Carol asked.

"Yeah, I guess so," Tyreese said.

"And let's just say that you and I were to have a baby and I didn't live through it, what would you do?" Carol asked.

"I'd be devastated," Tyreese said. He hugged Carol to him. "I don't want to lose you."

"And I don't want to have a baby," Carol responded, "but for the sake of argument let's say it happened. What would you do?"

"I don't know, Carol, I guess I'd have a baby," Tyreese said.

"Exactly," Carol said. "You'd have a baby, and you wouldn't just hand it over to someone else and ignore it for…what, how long has it been? Two years?"

Tyreese sighed. "No, I wouldn't do that," he said.

"That's the difference," Carol said. "I hate to sound heartless, but if Rick is dealing with some guilt right now, or some hurt, he's brought it on himself. It's not your fault and it's not mine. It's great that he's working his way into Judith's life however he can right now, but it's nobody's fault but his own that he's not the one that Judith thinks of as her Daddy."

"I guess you're right," Tyreese said.

"I'm always right," Carol said, kissing him again and returning her head to his chest.

Tyreese snickered.

"Yes you are, Carol, even though I forget that sometimes," Tyreese said.


	89. Chapter 89

"So we gon' do a supply run, just like we planned, but this time it ain't gonna be Maggie and Glenn goin' in there," Daryl said over breakfast. "Maggie ain't fit to go out and Glenn could use a little more time to get patched up himself."

"So who were you thinking of sending?" Rick asked.

The group was planning on returning now with van to the scene of the battle that had taken place at the school. With a group that size, Daryl couldn't ignore the fact that they had to have been prepared. There had to be supplies stocked up somewhere and he was anxious to bring it back to their community. They'd given themselves a little time to get over the shock of what they'd been forced to do there that day, but now they had to face it in hopes that whatever supplies there was would be left intact. He couldn't figure, after all, that too many looters would think to explore a school with a yard full of dead people for food and other necessities.

"I ain't decided exactly, I reckon whoever feels up to goin'," Daryl said. "I think we oughta take two vans, 'cause we don't know how much they had stockpiled. I'd rather do this in one trip if we can, get everyone back here safe as quick as possible. I don't reckon no less than six people need to go. We don't know if we gonna see just Walkers, and we don't know how many of 'em there's gonna be. Could run into other groups too, other survivors," Daryl said.

"I'll go," Beau offered.

"No, you ain't gon' go 'cause you and Carl done got a job huntin' for the day. I want ya out there in the woods gettin' whatever you can," Daryl said. "Me and Rick'll go, who else wants in?"

"I'll go," Tyreese offered.

"I'm in," Jimmy offered.

"If Jimmy's going, I'm going," Junior said.

"I'll go," Stella said, "I'd like to get out of here for a couple of hours."

"Good," Daryl said. "We'll get out there, get all that we can, and we'll get back here as quick as we can. It shouldn't take the day."

The group finished breakfast and everyone that was going on the run immediately headed back to their houses to get their weapons and get ready to go. Daryl already had his crossbow with him, so he went to start making sure the vans were ready.

"Don't take any chances out there," Michonne said, walking up to Daryl as he turned off the second van, assured that they both ran well.

"I don't never take no chances, woman," Daryl said, smiling at her. "We got a good group goin', we ain't gonna have no trouble, don't you worry about that."

"I've told you before, Daryl, I'm always going to worry when you go out there, no matter what you're going out for," Michonne said. "I can't help it."

Daryl closed the van door and reached out, grabbing Michonne's hand. She intertwined her fingers in his. He pulled her to him, kissing her deeply enough that moaned into his mouth.

"You hold on to that," Daryl said, pulling away and grinning at her. "I'll be expectin' to pick up right there when I get home."

"Ass!" Michonne said, pretending to be annoyed with Daryl for the suggestive kiss. "It's rude to kiss someone like that and leave them hanging," she said.

"Ain't leavin' ya hangin', 'Chonne, just leavin' ya with a promise," he growled. "Just be ready when I get home."

Michonne kissed him again quickly and then turned to leave. She wouldn't wait to see the group off, not wanting to embarrass Daryl. No one else was gathering to see them off, no one seeing the run as much of a big deal. She didn't want to be the over emotional pregnant woman hanging all over the fence as they rolled out.

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"God it smells like shit out here," Daryl said, getting out of the truck. He was almost knocked over by the smell of rotting flesh. The Walker population in the area was low, and he figured that was in part owing to the interest that their community drew from the Walkers, and also owing to the fact that the smell of death here could cover up the smell of anything living, so the Walkers probably wouldn't find it a prime dining possibility.

"It's ripe, you're right about that," Tyreese said, closing his truck door. He turned his head at a heaving sound.

Junior sauntered up beside Tyreese and Daryl.

"I think that Jimmy and his breakfast have decided to part company," Junior said, shielding his eyes from the sun with his hand.

"Might as well get it over when he can," Daryl said. "Mine ain't exactly feelin' like it was 'fore we got out here."

"I hope we get a lot of good stuff out of this," Rick said. "Just to make it worth the stench."

When they were all out of the vans they surveyed the area outside of the fences. There were no Walkers that proved any immediate threat to them. Inside the fences the bodies were left where they had been before. Daryl was a little surprised that none of them were up and ambling about. They'd tried to put them all down, but he'd thought that they might have missed one or two given the confusion of the day.

"Let's go in, but y'all keep your eyes open. Might be Walkers in some a' the buildings. Remember, if you run into anybody in there and you don't feel threatened by 'em, call out for the rest of us, but if you feel even threatened for a minute you get rid of 'em," Daryl said, starting forward to crawl back through the hole that he had once entered in the heat of battle.

As they made their way through the schoolyard, stepping over the fly covered corpses, Daryl tried to hold back his own urge to vomit. They'd been in some pretty nasty situations before, the smell here was ridiculous, probably made worse by the baking sun.

"It's kind of creepy," Jimmy said from behind him. "It's like a graveyard."

"What's scary," Junior said, "is to think that we did this."

"Don't think about that, boys," Rick said. "You don't need to dwell on that. We all did what we had to do."

"Alright," Daryl said. "It looks clear, but keep ya eyes open. Looks like they's these three main buildin's and them three little storage units," he pointed. "Jimmy, Junior, y'all go check them units out. Pile up whatever you think we might want. Rick, you and Tyreese go in that buildin' over there. If'n we can find the cafeteria I'm bettin' that's where they kept most the stuff, but check all the rooms and the closets just in case. I'll take Stella with me and we'll go in this buildin'. Later we can check out the rest. Holler if ya run into trouble."

Everyone understood their roles and their positions and they started off in the directions assigned to them.

Daryl wasn't used to working with Stella, but he worried that she might be the weakest link out there, and if anyone was going to get stuck protecting someone, he thought it would be best if it were him. The girl had been quiet the entire time, simply following along, her fingers pressing her nose closed against the invading smell.

Daryl pulled open the doors to the building that they were going to enter and Stella followed him inside. The doors opened into a hallway and Daryl started down it. The first thing they came upon was an office of sorts. Daryl checked it quickly and then moved out of the way for Stella to pass by him. They checked the office area quickly, but there was little of interest. Stella found a box and silently filled it with some crackers and bottled water that she found scattered in some of the drawers. She carried it with her as they passed back into the hall and continued to glance into various rooms.

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"So if we do what Sadie taught me, then we could talk about just about anything and we'd never have to say a word to each other," Carl explained, following Beau through the woods. They'd set the rabbit traps already, and now they were in search of whatever else they could get to take back to eat.

"Sounds stupid ta me," Beau said. "Just shut yer mouth an' keep yer eyes out for somethin' we can take back. Carol ain't gonna be happy if'n we don't come back with nothin' 'cause you was yappin' the whole damn time."

Carl lowered his voice, scanning the area for any sign of movement.

"Just because you're mad that Sadie didn't _kiss_ you doesn't mean it's stupid, and it doesn't mean that Sadie's stupid," Carl said.

Beau continued along in front of him.

"How did'ja know about that?" Beau growled back in a whisper.

"I saw you," Carl said. "I saw you kiss Sadie and then you got mad and left."

"You shouldn't have been spyin' on no one," Beau hissed back.

"I wasn't spying, you kissed her on the porch. I was just walking to my house," Carl argued, careful not to raise his voice above the noise level they'd already deemed appropriate.

Beau huffed and continued on. Carl was growing aware that they'd gone much farther than they had in the past, but he stuck close to Beau. When he saw a squirrel he put his hand up, stilling Beau's steps. Carl raised his bow, took aim, and dropped the squirrel.

"I got it!" He said with excitement.

"Yeah, one squirrel, lotta good that's gonna do us," Beau said, unenthusiastically. Carl ignored him and went to retrieve the squirrel, tying it quickly to a length of twine that he was wearing draped around his chest just as Daryl had showed him.

"I don't see any squirrels on your string," Carl said, feeling satisfied with himself.

Beau ignored him and continued on.

They crossed over to some kind of clearing, Beau stepping into it first. Beau eased through, his eyes searching in all directions, not anxious to lead them into any kind of trap. The cover of the woods falling behind them making him uncomfortable at first. The first thing that he could see, though, was a long wooden fence, and then what he saw excited him.

"Well looka here, looka here," he whispered in a sing-song manner.

"What is it," Carl asked, pushing up against the hand that Beau had reached back to keep him from drawing closer.

"Just what's gon' make us heroes, Carl," Beau said. "They gon' write songs 'bout us! How much a' that rope ya got in ya bag, 'cause we gon' need us a mess a' rope!"

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Tyreese and Daryl stood on one side of the fence and loaded up everything that was passed over to them by Rick, Junior, and Jimmy. Stella stood not too far from them, picking off the few straggling Walkers that dared to come near the corpse ridden area.

They'd picked up a good number of things. There had been boxes of food, a lot of hygiene products, and most other everyday items. In addition they'd found a few weapons, though not many, and a toolbox that would be a nice addition to the tools that they'd already stockpiled.

Daryl thought Tyreese looked pleased with the spoils, but he couldn't help but feel that it wasn't as exciting as he'd hoped it would be. This had been a group that planned ahead, that much was obvious, but they hadn't been like his community. It was clear that they hadn't been intent on staying, they were just squatting at best.

It made Daryl wonder how many people out there were trying to do what his group was doing and trying to build some semblance of a normal life. If most people were surviving by moving from place to place, scavenging where they could, or squatting for brief periods in one spot and then moving forward, maybe that was the way to go. Daryl knew that eventually his group planned to move on, that much was true, and so far something that couldn't be avoided, but they apparently weren't moving with the same frequency as others.

Still, he had to admit that they were happy with their community, and as long as they could remain there he didn't intend to uproot them. They were thriving, at least as much as anyone could these days, and he didn't want to doubt himself and imagine that he was leading them wrong by not insisting that they continue in an endless chain of making and breaking camps.

"That's it," Rick said, crawling back through the hole in the fence, followed by the two boys. "We can head back. It's been a good day, no one lost."

Daryl grunted and made his way around to the driver's seat of the van that he had driven there.

"Let's roll out," he said, watching as everyone started to head back to their places in the vans. "We're homeward bound."

As they drove off, Daryl looked in the rearview mirror at the gruesome sight behind him. He hoped never to return to that school. Part of him was bothered by the sight of all those corpses there, all those lives lost in an instant, and by the knowledge that he had played a big part in their demise. The other part of him shivered to think of the horror of his own group suffering that fate instead of those that he left behind rotting. It wasn't easy to stomach, at times, the thoughts of the massacre that had taken place, but it made it much easier when he thought that this group could have come knocking at their gates, and then it would be his family that would have been left chopped down, as though none of them had ever existed.

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Rick had set a vigil inside the gates, offering to take watch over for Maggie and Seth. He sat alone in one of the plastic chairs, staring toward the wooded area.

They'd been back for a while, unloaded the vans, and Carol was preparing dinner. Daryl had even been out once, returning with the rabbit traps which had been set in their normal place. He'd reported that he'd followed their tracks for a while, but they'd apparently crossed the creek and then there'd been all sorts of footsteps. There was no clear way of knowing where they'd gone.

Rick felt a hand on his shoulder and he turned. Sadie was standing next to him.

"He'll be fine," she said. "He's with Beau, and it isn't dark yet. Beau will find his way back," she said.

Rick didn't say anything to her. He didn't know what to say. He couldn't figure out what the boys were doing or why they'd wandered so far just to go hunting. They should be back by now and he wasn't even going to pretend that he wasn't worried. He realized that he couldn't imagine what he'd do with himself if Carl didn't come back. He wasn't prepared for this. He'd just started feeling normal, just started to feel like he was really working through his feelings about Lori and about Judith. Now Carl was out there somewhere with a kid he wasn't sure was even smart enough to struggle through a Dick and Jane book without assistance.

"They shouldn't have been gone this long," he argued. "Beau should know better than to venture so far from the community. What if they got snatched up by one of those groups passing through? There's no telling what could have happened to them."

Rick waited a minute, but there was no response from Sadie. He glanced up at her for a minute, her hand still resting on his shoulder and realized that she hadn't heard his argument at all. She was completely unaware that he was speaking. She was just standing beside him, her hand on his shoulder, watching in the same direction that he'd been staring at for what felt like ages.

Rick sighed and tried to will away the headache that was threatening to come upon him. He wanted to go out there looking for them, but he wasn't a tracker, and if Daryl said their footsteps disappeared into what had been a high traffic area, he knew he'd have no chance of finding them. Now all he could do was wait and hope that the footsteps that Daryl had seen didn't indicate any kind of scuffle with some opposing group.

After what seemed like a long while, Rick felt Sadie squeeze his shoulder, her fingertips digging into him.

"Look," she said, pointing.

Rick looked in the direction that she was pointing, but he didn't see anything.

"There's nothing there," he said, reaching his hand back and touching her arm so that she would look at him. She looked back, squinting.

"Look, I see them, don't you see them?" She said.

Rick looked again, but he was quickly becoming concerned that Sadie was seeing things, apparently not an uncommon occurrence in this day and age. He touched her arm again.

"There's nothing there, it's your imagination," he said.

Sadie shook her head, narrowing her eyebrows at him. She looked back.

"No, there they are, they're coming," she said, almost sounding excited, her body responding. "They're not alone. They're pulling something."

Rick sighed and watched her a second. He turned back. Then, just in the distance through the trees, he _could_ see them coming, though he had no clear ideas that they were pulling anything. He was just relieved to see the two distant figures bobbing toward them.

Rick stood up and started fooling with the gates, trying to get the lock undone. Sadie moved beside him and he realized that she was wearing her machete. She had apparently come prepared to take watch with him.

When the boys finally arrived close enough for him to see them clearly, both were wearing huge grins plastered across their faces, and each one of them _was_ pulling something, except they weren't pulling anything dead.

Rick and Sadie cleared the few Walkers from around the gates and the boys passed through, beaming over their spoils. Everyone around gathered to see what they had collected. Carl was dragging a rope behind him that was linking together two very dirty pigs. Beau had a similar lease, but his bore two goats instead.

"What is this?" Carol asked, coming closer to the boys. Both of them were filthy, and their clothes were torn.

"We got us a prize," Beau said. "We done found us a farm house an' look at what we found just a hidin' out there. We only brought back a pair of each, but they is more where this came from."

"I don't understand," Carol said. "How did you get them?"

"It was a farm," Carl explained. "There were all kinds of animals there, but the Walkers already ate them, cows and horses and what we think were chickens. There are pigs and goats, though, and the Walkers didn't eat them."

Rick had walked over now. He grabbed Carl to him, hugging him. Carl didn't respond, too swept up in his excitement to understand that the community was concerned.

"Why didn't the Walkers eat them then?" Carol asked.

Beau grinned at her.

"Too dern fast, I reckon," he responded. "They's some spry little animals. We 'bout beat ourselves up tryin' to wrestle these. I done tore up both my knees real good, and Carl he done tore up at least one a' his elbows, but we got 'em. Now they can make us babies just like them rabbits we got an' we gon' eat good."

Carol grinned then, realizing the possibility.

"We don't have any pens," she said suddenly, casting a glance at Daryl.

"One of them houses on the other street's gotta little penned up yard," Daryl said. "We can put 'em in there for the night and tomorrow we can figure out what we gonna do with 'em."

"We can go back fer more," Beau offered, "but we was gettin' hungry just as we got these fellers tied up so we thought we'd come in for the night."

"Come on, boys, Mark will take care of your scrapes while I finish dinner. Daryl, can you take our new pets over to their temporary home?" Carol said.

Daryl gathered up the ropes from Beau and Carl. "Yeah, I got it," he said.

"We did good, didn't we dad?" Carl asked, beaming up at Rick.

"You did real good, Carl." Rick said. He wanted to scold the boy about wandering too far and staying gone as long as he had, but the look on Carl's face was a look of pride that he hadn't seen in some time. Though he'd been worried, Rick couldn't bring himself to disturb such a look. "You did real good," he repeated, hugging Carl briefly before the boy headed off toward headquarters to get cleaned up.


	90. Chapter 90

**AN: This one's a short one. Sorry about that. I hope to have a longer one out for you tomorrow when our group goes on another little adventure. ;-)**

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"I bet you, though, where there's one farm there's another," Tyreese said. "So that poor farmer's cows and chickens didn't make it, that doesn't mean another one's didn't."

"I don't know the area well enough to tell you that. I only ever came here to do things in town, not to ride out through the countryside that much, but I do know that when I was first wandering I came upon a lot of houses," Michonne said.

"But were they farm houses?" Daryl asked.

"I don't know, I wasn't paying that much attention. Those were the early days. I did my best to avoid houses because where there were houses there were people, and where there people you were either going to find Walkers or get yourself shot," Michonne reasoned.

"I think we should go out and at least see what we can find," Glenn argued. "I wouldn't mind eating some fresh eggs again."

"And you have to admit that fresh milk would sure be a lot better than the powdered stuff," Maggie said.

"If we're going to start raising livestock, we've got to have a barn, that's all there is to it," Tyreese said. "I bet we could convert one of those houses in some way, but any animal we're going to keep penned up is going to have shelter, and that little dog pen might hold those goats and pigs, but it isn't going to stop a cow unless ole Bessie is really docile," Tyreese said.

Glenn and Maggie had come over after dinner to visit with the household and now they had launched into talking about the "what ifs" of maybe collecting more animals. The thought of producing more than crops and rabbits was exciting enough to keep them all up after what they would normally consider their bedtimes.

Now the girls were tucked away, exhausted by playing with their company, and everyone was bunched around the living room, watching each other in the lamplight.

"I'm pretty useless for a while," Maggie said, referring to her arm which still had quite a bit of healing to do after her injury in the battle, "but I can feed and water animals well enough. It would give me something to do, some way to help contribute."

"You contribute plenty, Maggie, don't worry about that," Carol said. "Still it could be nice to have milk and eggs, I'll admit to that."

"Could be trouble, though," Daryl said. "Too many of 'em would draw more Walker attention, so we gotta keep a close check on the fences, keep 'em cleared so they don't get too bunched up against 'em."

"I could clear fences," Michonne said. Daryl turned his head and looked at her. "I'm serious," she protested. "Think about it, how hard is it for me to walk around the parameter and stab Walkers through the fence? I need some exercise, and I could always stop when I get tired."

"I reckon that would be alright," Daryl said, "but I don't want ya takin' Hope ner Judith with ya to do it. I don't want them playin' round them fences."

"That I can agree with," Michonne said. She tried to hide the fact that she was a little excited to be on some kind of active duty again, even if it was just walking around and clearing Walkers through the fence. It would have to be more stimulating than laundry and crop watering.

"So tomorrow I'll see if I can't get some people working on figuring out at least some sort of temporary shelter until I can get some kind of barn made up. Daryl, are you going to take some people out to see what other animals you can scrounge up?" Tyreese asked.

"I reckon so," Daryl said. "I'll take Beau an' Carl so they can show me where they found the ones they got. Even if we don't get much we can at least scout the area, see what we might expect ta be able ta bring in."

"And this little one and I," Michonne said, rubbing her belly, "will make sure the fences are nice and clear."

Daryl leaned over and pulled Michonne to him, kissing her.

"You real excited 'bout that now, ain't'cha?" Daryl said smiling.

"I am," she admitted. "I won't lie. I've been feeling a little cooped up for a while."

"You're getting closer, though," Maggie said. "Are you excited about that?"

"I've still got a bit to go," Michonne said. "I don't know if excited is exactly the right word."

"I'm excited," Daryl said, putting his hand on her belly, "I want him ta hurry up an' get here."

"Him?" Maggie asked.

Michonne snickered.

"Daryl is determined it's a boy," she explained.

"Oh, and you don't think it is?" Maggie asked.

"I don't know if it's a boy or a girl, but I'm not as determined as Daryl either way," Michonne said.

"As for when he or she will get here," Carol piped up, "we've still got a while by my calculations. If I'm right, this little one is coming well on into the winter, which is good for Michonne because it means she won't have to be huge with the heat."

"Ok, I have to ask," Glenn said after a second, "is it really all that bad? I mean as men we get bombarded with all these stories about hormones and heat and labor, but honestly is it all _that _bad? Isn't some of it just a put on?"

"You, son, are treading on dangerously thin ice right now," Tyreese warned.

Glenn looked over at him and smiled a nervous smile.

"I mean no offense," he said, raising his hands up at Michonne, "if it is all that bad, I didn't mean anything by it, but I really want to know."

"I'm not going to answer that," Michonne said. "If I answer that question then it's just going to be discredited, like everything else, as being a result of my hormones."

Maggie laughed so hard that she snorted and in response several others laughed at her.

"I'll answer it then," Carol offered. "I guess it all depends on the woman as to what she feels about pregnancy and birth. Parts of it are great, but parts of it are awful. When I was pregnant…"

"And dinosaurs roamed the Earth," Glenn said, grinning. Carol shot him a look and he dropped his smile. "Sorry, it was too perfect."

"Do you want me to answer your question or not?" Carol asked.

"I'm sorry, go ahead, you were saying…" Glenn said, holding up his hands defensively.

Tyreese silently pulled a pillow from behind his back and handed it to Carol. She leaned over and swatted Glenn with it twice.

"I was saying…that when I was pregnant the morning sickness really sucked. There were hormones, but I tried to control them…I wasn't really in a position to be moody. Sophia was born right in the middle of a Georgia summer, and I can tell you that I was _miserable_ with the heat. As for labor and delivery, I opted for drugs, and even then I don't remember it as being the most fun I ever had," Carol said.

Michonne snickered.

"I can tell you that my experience with drugs and my experience without them varied greatly," Michonne offered.

"Fine, you win," Glenn said. "I guess I'll just have to accept that it is that bad, since I'm not going to have any way of finding out, and I'm starting to think that I wouldn't want to if I could."

"Good answer," Tyreese said. He stretched and stood up. "If you good people will excuse me, I think I'm ready for bed. And you, young lady," he said, reaching his hand out to Carol, "it's past your bedtime."

Carol smiled at him and took his hand, letting him pull her up to her feet.

"You're probably right, us old folks need our sleep. Goodnight, everyone," she said. She followed Tyreese up the stairs.

"I guess that's probably our cue to head off to bed too," Maggie said. "Game night soon? We could get Mark and Sadie down here too."

"Sounds good ta me," Daryl said. He got up and offered his hands to Michonne who accepted his help getting off the couch.

"I vote charades," Glenn said. "We put Sadie and Michonne together. The woman with the fewest expressions I've ever met playing with the woman with the most expressions, that should be entertaining in itself."

"And I bet we skunk everyone," Michonne said.

They saw Glenn and Maggie out, bidding them goodnight, and then Michonne and Daryl took their lamp and started up the stairs.

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"What would ya rather have, 'Chonne? Chickens or cows?" Daryl asked.

Michonne wasn't sleepy yet, so she was forcing him to engage in conversation with her. He was laying sleepily on his side while she sat up in bed. He was trailing his fingers lazily over her stomach.

"I think I'd rather have the eggs than the milk," Michonne said. "Do you think we could milk the goats?"

"I reckon we could, 'Chonne, but ain't never tried ta milk no goat," he answered, yawning.

"What would you rather have?" Michonne asked.

"Don't matter to me none," Daryl answered. "In the end they all eat the same."

"If we get more pigs we could butcher a couple of them," Michonne said.

"You want'cha a pig to butcher?" Daryl asked.

"I have to admit that the idea of bacon does sound good," Michonne said. She didn't mention that it sounded even better to her if it was bacon and eggs. She could make due with whatever she had, and she didn't want to seem too demanding.

"If'n ya want'cha a pig for butcherin', then I'll get'cha a pig for butcherin'," Daryl said. "Beau said they was more of 'em out there, I'll just make sure one of 'em goes to slaughter."

"And what's everyone going to say about you deciding to butcher a pig if they weren't ready to start butchering them?" Michonne asked.

"I reckon it'd be a pretty bad accident, if'n I was to accidentally kill one a' them pigs on the way back," Daryl said. "Wouldn't have no choice but ta butcher it then, 'Chonne."

Michonne snickered.

"Have we become that devious, Daryl? You'd pretend you accidentally killed a pig just to butcher it for me to have bacon?" Michonne asked.

"Ain't nothin' new, 'Chonne," Daryl said. "I can't give ya much, but I'd do whatever I had to do if'n I could give ya somethin' ya wanted. That ain't gonna change. Somethin' little as a pig ta eat is easy."

"You do a lot for me, Daryl," Michonne said. "I just want you to know I appreciate it, all of it."

Daryl sat up the, rolling over and resting on both of his elbows, looking up at her leaning against the pillows.

"I know you 'preciate it, 'Chonne. I _like_ doin' stuff for ya," he said. "It's all I can do for everythin' you do for me."

"What have I done for you, Daryl?" Michonne asked. She didn't feel like she'd done much for Daryl, not really. It seemed like Daryl was always trying to figure out some way to make things work, some way to keep them going, to keep them safe. Lately Michonne was feeling pretty useless, and right now she was feeling _very_ useless. She picked at the blanket.

"What'cha goin' through, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked. He looked at her with a concerned look on her face. "You done plenty for me. I mean just ta name the a couple a' things you gave me Hope an' right now you're busy growin' this guy for me," he said.

Michonne looked at him. She was suddenly feeling emotional, but she didn't want to be feeling that way.

"I didn't exactly get pregnant on my own, Daryl, and it's not some big feat to have a baby," she argued.

Daryl smiled.

"You in a mood, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked. "My part in all this weren't that big, ya know. I reckon you put a lot more into havin' 'em than I do, so you oughta get more of the credit."

Daryl reached over and took Michonne's hand, kissing it gently.

"I can see ya in a mood, 'Chonne. Scooch on down here an' let me hold ya 'til it passes, OK?" Daryl said, smiling.

Michonne slid down in the bed, pulling her pillow up under her head.

"I'm sorry, Daryl," Michonne said when he wrapped his arm around her.

"What'cha sorry for?" Daryl asked.

Michonne didn't know how to explain to Daryl that she had no idea why she suddenly felt like she did right now.

"I'm just sorry," Michonne said.

"Don't be sorry, 'Chonne, ain't nothin' ya gotta be sorry for. Just close ya eyes an' go to sleep. You'll feel better in the mornin'," Daryl said. He snuggled Michonne against him and kissed her neck, trailing over to kiss her shoulder and then her back. "Just go ta sleep, 'Chonne," he said, yawning.

"I love you, Daryl," Michonne said.

"I love ya too, 'Chonne," Daryl said, squeezing Michonne again and yawning once more.


	91. Chapter 91

Daryl left with Rick, Beau, Carl, and Jimmy a little after breakfast, all of them carrying backpacks with extra rope, in case they came upon animals that they wanted to lead back, or even in case they ran up on supplies they wanted to take back.

The group followed Beau quietly through the woods, each taking turns picking off the random Walkers they encountered.

"We gettin' close?" Daryl asked Beau, realizing now why the boys had been so late returning. They'd wandered a good distance from anywhere that they normally went.

"'Bout there," Beau responded.

"I hope we find a whole zoo," Jimmy said. "I'd fancy eating anything different for a change."

"Don't get too excited," Rick said to him. "Getting too excited could just make the disappointment worse if we don't find a lot."

"There are more pigs and goats at least," Carl offered. "We just didn't have time to catch more than we got if we weren't going to lose the light, and Beau didn't want us wandering back in the dark."

"Ain't nobody got no business out after dark if'n they can avoid it," Daryl grunted.

Beau shushed the parade of people behind him, nearing the place where he knew the woods to clear revealing the field behind the farm house. He stepped up to the underbrush that formed almost a hedge. He stooped there a minute, looking through the brush. He signaled to Daryl to come forward and Daryl stooped down next to him.

In front of them was a pasture, or what had once been a pasture. The fences that had once lined it were torn down in places and the grass was overgrown, hiding in places the remains of what had probably been cows that had suffered the fate of being Walker snacks. Not too far away was the two story farm house and an old barn.

"We found the pigs an' goats near that barn. There was a chicken coop there too, but it looked like all the chickens had been torn apart," Beau responded. "I reckon they weren't smart enough to seek some shelter."

"Let's go see what's left, then," Daryl said. He stood up and started across the pasture, crawling between what was left of a part of the fence that was still somewhat standing. Beau passed him, covering ground a little quicker than he was.

"Just up there," Beau said, pointing. "The barn's open an' they tried ta run in there, so I'm bettin' we gon' find 'em there."

"Be careful," Daryl said, "could be Walkers hangin' around, we don't wanna get caught by too many."

Suddenly a gunshot rang out and Daryl became immediately aware of a bullet crashing into the dirt just between him and Beau.

"The fuck?" He asked, taking a minute to figure out what was going on. He didn't have long to think about it before another shot rang out, apparently also missing its mark. "Fuck! Get down, someone's shootin' at us!"

Immediately they all dropped and tried to make their way back toward the wooded area they'd recently come from. Daryl retreated, looking around to try and figure out where the shots were coming from. Beau was just in front of him, attempting to do the same apparently.

The group made their way slowly back to the covering the woods offered, gunshots peppering the dirt around them but luckily whoever was doing the shooting wasn't exactly skilled at making their mark, though they came close.

Once they'd gained the cover of the woods, Daryl thought they were safe, at least for a minute, and that they might have the opportunity then to figure out who their attacker was. Whoever it was had to be closer than the farmhouse, but they weren't out in the open unless they were a master of camouflage.

"Look there," Beau said, pointing and tugging at Daryl's arm. Just as he said it, another peppering of gunfire was fired at the brush around them. Daryl followed Beau's line of sight and saw who was shooting. He was torn for a minute, not wanting to kill the person, but also determined not to let them continue to haphazardly fire at them. He realized he could make a strategic shot and took advantage of the person reloading to aim and fire an arrow, hoping it was a bullseye and would cause only limited damage.

Their attacker dropped, squalling, just in the clearing ahead of them, having obviously been hidden in the same woods that they'd emerged from just before she began firing.

"What the hell is going on?" Jimmy asked.

Daryl sat back a minute, trying to wrap his mind around everything.

"She was fuckin' shootin' at us, so I shot her in the ass," Daryl said. "I had to distract her."

The squalling continued.

"I think you distracted her, Daryl," Rick said. "Now what are we going to do? She _was_ shooting at us, unprovoked."

"Fuck this! She looked like a fuckin' _kid_." Daryl growled.

"So we take her back?" Beau asked.

"I don't know, give me a minute to think," Daryl said. He considered it. He hated the idea of taking in some other random kid, and he didn't really like the idea that she'd been shooting at them, but then again he didn't know why she'd been shooting at them. Maybe she'd felt threatened by their group moving through the field near where she was. "Damn it," he said, getting up and taking his crossbow. He slipped out into the pasture again, nervous that someone else would begin firing. There wasn't any fire though.

Daryl made his way toward the screaming girl writhing on the ground. She'd dropped the gun she'd been firing and Daryl kicked it out of the way as he came upon it. Suddenly he was aware that the rest of his group was flanking him, Rick almost at his side.

"Stop hollerin' like that or you're gonna be Walker lunch," Daryl said, starting to take in the figure wallowing on the ground in front of him. She didn't stop screaming, though, she simply took to her hands and knees and began crawling away from him in an awkward manner. "Ain't gonna get far like that," he said, pursuing her.

"We're not going to hurt you," Rick called out.

"'Cept for that arrow," Daryl said, "but we had to do that so you'd stop shootin' at us."

The girl continued to crawl forward, but she was running out of steam, that much was obvious. Daryl was almost amused.

"You can stop now," Daryl said. "We said we ain't gonna hurt ya none."

"Maybe she's like Sadie an' you gotta talk at her face," Beau offered.

The screaming had stopped now, and the girl apparently gave up on her attempted escape. She slumped forward onto the ground. Now she was just lying there.

"Is she dead?" Jimmy asked, sounding a little concerned.

"She ain't fuckin' dead. I shot her in the ass, not in the damn head," Daryl said. He continued forward, catching up to her. He was a little concerned about the fact that she'd just given up after showing so much enthusiasm moments before. He knelt down near her, prepared for just about anything. If he'd learned anything since this whole thing started it was never to underestimate someone.

"Why was you shootin' at us?" He asked. The _girl_ was probably around the same age as many of the young people that already populated their community. Her hair was a tangled mess, and she was filthy and obviously badly sunburned. She didn't respond to Daryl, she just lie there, looking at him, not lifting her head off the ground. "Let's try this again," he said, "can you hear me?"

The girl lie still for a little bit, still panting a little, but Daryl saw that the fear that had been in her eyes when he'd first knelt beside her was fading. Perhaps she was calming down a little now and realizing that they weren't going to hurt her.

"Beau, can you take Carl and Jimmy an' go see what you can scratch up in the way a' animals?" Daryl asked after a moment. "Rick an' me will wait her out."

Daryl sat back, still watching the girl. Rick stood next to him, shifting his weight every now and again. Beau didn't answer Daryl, but he did start across the pasture leading the others.

"I think we got us another one," Daryl said to Rick when everyone else was gone. "I don't think she can hear us."

"I can hear ya just fine, _asshole_," the girl spat suddenly.

Daryl was surprised. Rick chuckled.

"Why was you shootin' at us?" Daryl asked.

The girl didn't respond, but she didn't change her position. She was frozen there, lying on the ground.

Rick kneeled down then.

"Do you have a name?" Rick asked.

The girl swallowed, her eyes darting between the two of them.

"Do you want to tell us your name?" Rick asked. "We're not going to hurt you."

"Ya fuckin' shot me!" The girl spat.

"You were shooting at us," Rick said. "We just stopped you from maybe killing one of our group. The wound isn't serious, and we may be able to help you with it, but you're going to have to cooperate."

"I was shootin' at ya 'cause some 'a your damn boys took my food yesterday, I weren't lettin' y'all take no more, but it looks like ya gon' take what the hell ya please," she said.

"Fair enough," Rick said. He looked at Daryl.

"What's your name, kid?" Daryl asked.

"Libby," the girl responded. "Ya gonna tell your boys to leave my food alone now? Or ya just gonna take it?"

Daryl looked at Rick. It was clear that Rick was as conflicted as he was about the dirty redhead lying in the grass in front of them.

"You alone?" Daryl asked.

The girl didn't respond.

"Do ya gotta group?" Daryl asked, hoping to convince her to answer him.

"I ain't got no _group_," the girl growled. "I got a family, but I ain't got no group."

"How big is your family?" Rick asked. "Where are they?"

"I ain't tellin' ya where they are. Ya ain't got no business messin' with 'em," Libby responded.

"We don't wanna hurt 'em," Daryl offered. "We got us a group an' if you can act like ya got an ounce of raisin' we can take ya back there. Got some people can patch up that wound for ya too."

"I promise you," Rick said, "no harm is going to come to your family. We've got more food than just the animals we're taking. We've got medicine. If you're not happy, we'll patch you up and turn you loose, no one will force you to stay."

They were interrupted in their interrogation of Libby by Beau trotting up.

"Daryl, you might want'a come see this," he called.

"What is it?" Daryl asked.

"We found somethin' in the barn, but it ain't what we went in there after," Beau said.

"Don't you fuckin' hurt 'em," Libby said. Apparently her half nap in the dirt had renewed her energy and before Daryl could respond she was struggling to her feet. Daryl hit his and caught her, heaving her up and over his shoulder. She pounded at his back and pulled at his clothes. He had to hold her tight around the legs to keep from dropping her. "Damn she's a scrapper," he said. "Stop hittin' on me an' we goin' ta get your family."

Daryl turned and considered the distance to the barn. Libby wasn't heavy, but she wasn't exactly light either. He also had to consider how long it was going to take them back to the community.

"On second thought," he said, "Beau, go get 'em. We'll take whatever animals y'all done got back an' we'll take Libby here an' her family."

"Ok," Beau said, hesitating a moment.

"I'll come with you," Rick said. "Are you going to be alright with her, Daryl?"

"Yeah, just don't take too damn long. I don't wanna have ta drop her if a mess a' Walkers passes by," Daryl said.

Rick and Beau started toward the barn and Daryl waited quietly. Libby had apparently decided that her fate was decided and she stopped fighting for the time being.

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Daryl had been surprised when everyone had returned. In the time they were gone they'd gathered two more pigs, and two goats that were significantly larger than the ones they'd found the day before. They'd also shot an owl.

It wasn't the animals that surprised Daryl, though. Carl seemed to be leading them easily enough. It was the two children walking nervously alongside Rick and the other that Beau was carrying that threw Daryl off for a minute.

"What the hell?" Daryl asked. "Where'd ya get all them young'uns?" He asked Libby. She was now resting with her elbow digging into his back, apparently propping herself up on it.

"Emma is my sister," Libby said. "Jacob and Sam are my cousins."

"Y'all out here alone?" Daryl asked.

"We are now," Libby said. "Not that it's any a' your business."

The kids were filthy. Emma was probably ten years old, younger than Carl, that much Daryl could tell. She was just as redheaded as her sister, and somewhere under all that mess of hair Daryl imagined she had a face. He wasn't sure which of the boys were which, though. One of them was a good bit older than Judith, but Daryl didn't know how old he was. He had curly blonde hair that was almost white, and his brother had the same kind of hair, but he was about the size of Judith.

Daryl shook his head, but didn't say anything. Rick shot him a look.

"We need to get these kids back to the community," Rick said.

"They skittish?" Daryl asked, noticing that both Emma and the oldest boy had wildly daring eyes.

"They're a little jumpy, but they might calm down later. I told them we had Libby and lured them out of the loft with the little one, but none of them have said anything yet. Are you fine carrying Scout there, or do you need some help?" Rick said.

"I got her," Daryl responded. "Let's get a move on, I ain't lookin' to carry her no longer than I gotta."

Daryl started back into the woods, now carrying a now complacent Libby and leading a much larger group than he'd intended. He wondered how everyone would react when they greeted them, expecting a small zoo, and instead getting a group of dirty kids headed by a rough spoken spitfire of a girl. Daryl shook his head and sighed to himself, continuing along the path they'd made earlier.


	92. Chapter 92

**AN: So a thanks to anyone who is still reading. As always, reviews are greatly appreciated so let me know what you're thinking. **

**I may not be updating as frequently (or frequently at all) during the remainder of this week. I've got a lot going on real life, so I'll write when I can, but it may not be all that much. **

**No worries though, I'm not leaving or anything, and I know we've got a lot ahead of us. I had to laugh at messages that have called this story both a "saga" and a "novel". I thought it might end up being long when I started, but I really wasn't sure. All I really knew was that I was curious to see how Daryl and Michonne might end up together…I honestly had no idea that it would turn into the journey that we've been on so far! **

**That being said, I hope you're still enjoying yourself!**

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"Them kids is just a step above animals," Daryl said. He was sitting in the living room with Carol, Michonne, and Tyreese. Everyone was still trying to get over the busy evening that they'd had trying to clean up and tame the new arrivals to some degree. Libby was patched up, finally having been medicated by a frustrated Mark, and had insisted that they all share a room in the house that Beau was currently occupying alone.

"We don't know what they've been through, Daryl, and chances are those two boys are pretty feral, depending on how they've been raised," Carol responded. "All of them were filthy and covered in ticks. Mark had to basically cut all their hair off because it was so tangled, and he only managed that with me and Tyreese holding them down. Not to mention I'm pretty sure they've got nearly second degree sunburns. Life hasn't been easy for them."

"None of them talk," Tyreese said. "Do you think it's because they _can't_ talk or because they won't?"

"I don't know," Carol said. "They can scream pretty well, so their vocal chords are intact."

"Maybe they just need time, I mean it is a lot to take in," Michonne said.

"What I wanna know is how she kept all them young'uns alive," Daryl said. "Just don't make sense to me."

"We don't know her story, Daryl," Michonne reminded him. "We don't know how long they've been alone. That baby isn't hers, and _someone_ had to have it."

They sat in silence for a minute. Daryl chuckled and everyone cast their attention in his direction.

"What is it?" Michonne asked.

"Just thinkin' 'bout things…" Daryl said. "We sure have found us a mess a' people since we left Atlanta, an' I don't think none of 'em was what I expected."

Carol laughed.

"Our group is very different than it was outside of Atlanta, you're right about that, but I don't think many of the additions have been poor choices," Carol said.

"What we gon' do with a bunch a wild young'uns?" Daryl asked.

"I guess we're just going to have to tame them," Tyreese responded.

"And if we can't tame 'em, I reckon we gotta turn 'em loose," Daryl said.

"I'd hate to do that," Carol said. "Those boys are just babies and that girl, Emma, she's probably not even twelve. I'd hate to throw them back out there to try it on their own again."

Michonne nodded her agreement. It did seem terribly cruel to think of expecting children to survive on their own out there.

"But there's a reason we don't keep hornets as pets," Daryl said. "If they gon' be outta control it ain't safe havin' 'em here."

"I can agree with that," Tyreese said, "but I think they need an adjustment period. They need a little time to rest and adjust. They all ate like they were starved, and I think they drank a couple of gallons of water each. We don't really know how any one, especially children, would act in their position."

"At least let's sleep on it," Carol said. "They may even be better after a good night's rest without anything trying to hurt them. I just hope Beau is OK in the house with them."

"I think Beau can hold his own," Michonne said. "Knowing Beau, if it gets to be too much he'll just sleep in a tree in someone's yard."

Everyone laughed at her. It was a funny thought, but sadly it was true.

"Fine," Daryl said. "I ain't gonna worry 'bout it no more tonight. Tomorrow we'll see what we got."

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"I think I wanna move," Beau announced as he waited on his breakfast plate from Carol. She frowned at him. Nearly everyone was sitting down eating. Beau was one of the last to pass through the kitchen.

"Where's Libby and all the kids?" Carol asked.

Beau looked at her, expressionless.

"Why do you want to move, Beau?" Carol asked.

"'Cause she's crazy Carol an' that room smells like piss an' it's too hot ta have a room that smells like piss," Beau said, reaching for his plate. Carol realized she'd never handed it to him.

"I'll see what I can do, Beau, but you're welcome to bunk anywhere you please for the time being," Carol said. She handed him his plate.

"Don't'cha go up there alone, Carol, I'm tellin' ya she's plumb outta her head," Beau said. He slipped off toward the dining room.

Carol sighed and walked into the living room, regarding those that were still eating, those that were chatting about what needed to be accomplished during the day, and even those who were done and thoughtfully stacking dishes up for her take out to be washed later.

"Beth," Carol said, "do you think you could handle dishes today? I'm going to see if I can't go and make some connection with the new ones."

"Sure, Carol, I can wash dishes," Beth said.

"I can help her," Maggie said. "It's not like it's hard to keep an eye on the gates from out there."

"Thank you. Michonne, can you watch the girls?" Carol asked. She knew that Michonne had been planning on resuming her clearing of the fences, that much was obvious by the fact that she had her katana standing in the corner.

"No problem," Michonne said. "Are you sure you don't want me go with you?"

"No," Carol said, shaking her head. "I'd rather you stay with the girls."

"I can walk you over there," Tyreese offered.

"I don't think that's a good idea either," Carol said. "I don't want to intimidate them if they're a little shook up."

"Take Sadie," Mark offered. "She doesn't look like much, but she's pretty good to have as backup, and all their banshee screaming won't bother her if they choose to go the way of last night."

"That could work," Carol said. "Get her attention and ask her if she'll go with me."

A few minutes later the two of them were walking down the street toward the house. Daryl was a few steps behind them.

"I don't think you need to come, Daryl, you might rile Libby up," Carol called back to him.

"Ain't tryin' ta rile no one up, but I'm gonna wait downstairs just in case y'all need my help," Daryl said.

Carol giggled at him and they continued on. When they let themselves into the house and started up the stairs, Carol heard the door upstairs slam shut.

"Wait down here, Daryl," she said. Daryl stood awkwardly in the middle of the living room floor.

At the top of the stairs Carol knocked on the door that was closed, assuming that was the one the newest arrivals had taken. The upstairs did smell bad, so she could understand Beau's earlier complaint. They waited a moment but there was no response from behind the closed door.

"Libby, open up," Carol called. "We think you should come down, get something to eat."

_Learn the way we function around here._ Carol thought.

"She won't open the door?" Sadie asked, looking at Carol in a confused manner. Carol shrugged.

"Not yet," she replied. "Libby, I'm going to open the door now," Carol said. She reached up and turned the knob, pushing the door open and stepping back a bit, not quite knowing what to expect.

All the blankets and pillows that had been put in the room were piled on the floor. Emma and Jacob were hunkered down in the corner while Sam, the little one, was toddling around the room. Libby was standing between the door and the children.

"Libby, wouldn't you like to bring the kids down and get them something to eat?" Carol asked.

"Who the hell is she?" Libby responded, looking at Sadie.

"That's Sadie, she's not going to hurt anyone either," Carol said. "We just thought you might want to come down and have something to eat."

"An' if we don't wanna come out?" Libby asked.

"Libby, the kids are dirty and they smell, I promise you that no one is going to hurt you if you don't attack them first. We just want to help you. No one here is dangerous unless they're threatened," Carol assured her. "We've got kids here too. Sam would probably like to play with them. There are toys and everything here."

"Why you wanna give us stuff?" Libby asked. "What'cha want from me?"

Carol thought the girl was softening a little. She smiled.

"We don't want anything from you," she said. "No one here lives here because they have to. If you don't like it you're free to leave anytime."

Libby cocked her head to the side.

"You ever had nobody that left here before?" She asked.

"No," Carol said. "We've never had anybody that left here before. Come on out, you're safe here. We'll help you get the kids."

Carol was fairly confident that Libby was going to come out of the room now. Carol touched Sadie on the arm and gestured to her.

"Go ahead, Sadie, get the little one and Libby and I can bring the other two," she said. Sadie nodded. She walked between Libby and the door, passing into the room.

"Don't you touch him!" Libby commanded.

Before Carol could think, Libby turned and lunged at Sadie, who wasn't expecting such an attack. Sadie responded quickly and Carol backed up involuntarily as the two tangled up. The youngest child started wailing and ran in the direction of the other two children who were hunkered in the corner out of the way. Libby was on the floor fighting, and Sadie was on top of her.

"Daryl, get up here!" Carol yelled. Daryl was already bounding up the stairs.

"What happened? What's goin' on?" Daryl asked. He reached Carol and watched the scene, standing there for a minute.

"Do something about it!" Carol said.

"What'cha want me ta do about it?" Daryl asked.

"Aren't you going to break them up?" Carol couldn't believe that Daryl was just watching them.

"Who started it?" Daryl asked.

"Well…Libby I guess," Carol said.

"And Sadie's winnin'," Daryl said. "Way I see it, maybe Libby needs to be whooped a little, an' it ain't really no unfair fight, ain't like Sadie outweighs her…"

"Are you _serious, _Daryl?" Carol asked. She didn't know if she should try to break the two up or not. She wasn't even really sure what was taking place in the fight. For the most part it looked as though Sadie's entire goal was pinning the girl, but Libby didn't appear to have any rhyme or reason to her thrashing about.

Daryl shrugged. "We gotta tame her up somehow. If nothin' else she's learnin' that ya don't go startin' fights around here. I'll get her if she gets the best a' Sadie."

Carol realized Daryl _was_ serious. He was really willing to stand there and let the two women finish out whatever kind of battle was taking place. She turned her attention to the kids.

"It's scaring the kids, Daryl," Carol said.

"Then get 'em outta here. Libby's too busy to worry 'bout you right now," Daryl offered.

Carol walked toward the quiet kids.

"Come on, we're not going to hurt you. Libby is going to be fine," she offered, trying to keep her voice soothing. "Let's get out of this room, OK? Everything's going to be fine."

Carol stepped forward and Sam came to her easily enough. He was regarding the two women, but he seemed to be the least skittish of all four of them. She picked him up, cuddling him to her for a minute to reassure him.

"Come on, you two…Emma, Jacob, can you come with me? We'll get you something to eat. Come on," she urged, holding her free hand out toward them. "It's OK, come on."

Jacob finally came toward her timidly and she caught his hand.

"That's right, come on," she said.

She started out the door with the two boys, realizing that Emma was not coming easily.

"Get 'em on outta here," Daryl said. "I'm 'bout to break them two up, 'cause Sadie ain't even fightin' no more, she's just ridin' Libby 'til she wears out. I reckon I'll be out with the rest of 'em in a minute."

Carol took the boys and started out the house.

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Michonne wondered if someone should go and check on Daryl. He'd been in the house alone for a little while, and Daryl alone with three females might not go that well.

Finally, though, just as she was considering asking Tyreese to walk down there with her, Daryl came walking down the street. Beside him was a slightly disheveled Sadie. Libby walked just behind them with Emma holding her hand.

"Are they alright?" Michonne called, getting up from the chair she was sitting in watching the children play. Sam had made fast friends with Hope and Judith, and somewhere Glenn had Jacob, taking him to find some toys and clothes with Maggie.

"They are just fine," Daryl said. "Got some future black eyes an' busted lips, but nothin' that won't heal."

As they approached, Sadie slipped by and walked into headquarters. A few minutes later Mark came out.

"Mark, can you take our friend Libby here an' get her cleaned up? You might wanta take a look at them stitches she got last night, too. She mighta put a little stress on 'em today when she decided to tangle up with Sadie," Daryl said.

"Come on," Mark said, gesturing toward Libby who looked a little pouty about her situation. "Carol's got plates made up for you too. Emma can eat while I'm cleaning you up."

"Go on, now," Daryl said.

Libby and Emma both started toward Mark and followed him inside headquarters.

"What happened?" Michonne asked Daryl.

He grinned at her.

"Nothin' really, 'Chonne," Daryl said. "I made her an' Sadie make up, an' I told her that my beautiful wife and me was gonna take her on a tour of our community 'fore she made any decisions, but that if'n she wanted to leave, she was free to go after that."

"And she agreed that easily?" Michonne asked.

"Well, if we ain't holdin' her here, an' she can go if she wants, I don't really know what they is to complain about. You feel up ta playin' tour guide with me?" Daryl said.

Michonne shrugged.

"Sure, Daryl, I'll play tour guide with you," Michonne responded.

"Good, I reckon we'll get started just as soon as they done eatin'. Where's Carol?" Daryl asked.

"She's around back tending the rabbits," Michonne responded.

"I'ma tell her that she needs ta get that room cleaned up 'cause it smells something awful. I told Libby that if they stay she can have that room with Emma and we could help 'em get a room for the little ones fixed up in that extra room," he said.

"You really think that they're going to work out here?" Michonne asked. "Carol told me that she jumped Sadie."

"Sadie ain't sore about it," Daryl said. "And I reckon that they gon' work out just fine once Libby realizes we ain't tryin' to hold her captive in no prison nor nothin'. We ain't exactly got a bad place to live here, 'Chonne. She just needs ta see we ain't like that damn Governor. We don't aim to keep no one here that don't wanta be here."

Michonne nodded her head. If Daryl thought that all the girl needed was a tour of the community and the option to leave, then she was willing to give it a try. She'd been against them staying whenever Carol told her that she'd jumped Sadie, but if Sadie didn't hold a grudge about it, then it certainly wasn't her place to hold it against the girl.

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"So back here is where we do our business," Daryl said. "Ya had a bucket last night, but we don't normally do it like that."

Michonne walked along beside Daryl, watching Libby's reaction from time to time. The girl had examined their rabbit pens, listened to the various functions of headquarters, and had been introduced to the idea of the ration boxes, laundry, and meals. She'd also been shown the storage houses and assured that she and her family would get ration boxes with anything they needed should they decide to stay with the group. Now they were continuing their tour.

"As I reckon you done figured out, this here's the main street that we all got our houses on," Daryl said, pointing down the back side of the street.

"No one lives in them other houses?" Libby asked as they walked. Michonne noticed that the nature of the girl was already changing. She was obviously more relaxed than she had been earlier. She was walking more loosely, her arms swinging instead of rigidly folded across her chest.

"No," Daryl said, "at least not yet. I reckon they could if we decided they could stay, but we ain't brought in that many people."

As they continued on, with very little to point out at the moment, Michonne noticed the girl looking uncomfortably at the fences. The Walkers that gathered outside them were a normal sight to all of them, but she imagined that it might be difficult for someone who was new to the place to trust the fact that they weren't much of a threat.

"The Walkers haven't gotten in at all," Michonne said, addressing the concern look on Libby's face. "We try to clear the fences from time to time so that they don't pile up too badly, but so far they haven't been a threat inside the community, at least not since we cleared the place out."

Libby looked a little nervous still, but she didn't say anything.

"If'n ya decide to stay then you can go in any of the extra houses and take anything ya want. That's where we'll get'cha some stuff for the kids and get'cha room set up for you an' Emma," Daryl said.

"So no one cares if we take anything out of the houses?" Libby asked. "We ain't gotta pay nothin'?"

"No," Daryl said, "we don't pay for nothin' 'round here. Everythin' we got belongs to everybody, we're family."

Libby looked a little confused. Michonne was almost amused. It seemed like every time they'd brought someone new into the fold it had seemed strange to explain their situation. Now they were explaining how their family worked, how their lifestyle worked, and it didn't sound any less odd than it had before if you considered it with ears that hadn't built their current society.

"'Round here you gonna see some houses we tearin' down," Daryl said. "We're workin' on clearin' more land for things we need it for. We was gonna use it all for plantin', but if we can come up on some more animals then I'm thinkin' we might figure out how ta make it into some kinda home for our animals. Tyreese is workin' right now on figurin' out about stablin' 'em, especially for the winter."

"So this is where you're puttin' my pigs an' goats?" Libby asked.

"We might put _our_ pigs an' goats there, but we're still thinkin' on it. Right now they're penned up at another house," Daryl said.

"So if I leave my food ain't goin' with me?" Libby asked.

"If ya wanta leave, we'll send ya some food, but you ain't takin' the animals. If ya decide to stay, though, then ya gonna get your share of whatever meat we got," Daryl responded. "Anyway, if ya stay you can work all kinds a' jobs, and one of 'em is demolition. That means ya can pick to tear this stuff up if ya like it. Sadie likes demolition a lot…that's prob'ly why she got the best of ya this mornin'."

Michonne noticed that Daryl turned to look at Libby then with a mischievious look on his face. The girl screwed her face up.

"She only got the best a' me 'cause I didn't expect it," Libby said.

"You hit her first, I reckon she was the one that didn't expect it," Daryl said. He smiled a half smile. Watching him, Michonne couldn't help but smile. Now that the girl was calming down a little it appeared that Daryl was starting to become a little fond of her.

Libby huffed, but she didn't respond to Daryl's teasing.

"That there's the fields," Daryl said. "That's where we grow our food. Everybody works to pick it an' keep it watered."

Libby looked wide eyed at the variety of thriving plants. Daryl raised his hand, waving at Junior, Jimmy, and Chelsea who were currently working in the fields.

"You work here all day?" Libby asked.

"Depends," Michonne responded. "No one really has an assigned job. You do what you feel like doing, or what needs to be done. If you get tired of working one kind of job, you can always do another. Carol keeps up with it though. She's not really the _boss_, so to speak, but she keeps track of who's doing what so that nothing gets ignored that needs to be done. We all pull our weight how we can."

"Then there's the other jobs we got around here, like watchin' the gates, takin' care of the kids, an' of course people gotta go for water an' go huntin' if you're good at that," Daryl said.

"Most everyone takes turns going for water," Michonne said. "It's not that hard to do. Usually we go in threes to be able to carry more water back safely."

"I know ya had a gun, but ya weren't no good at usin' it," Daryl said, "so what else ya been usin' as a weapon?"

Libby screwed her face up again.

"I reckon I do alright with a gun, it sure scared ya," she said.

Daryl chuckled.

"Yeah, it scared me, but I hit you, you didn't hit me," Daryl said.

"I ain't used ta shootin' it no way," Libby said.

"Fair enough," Daryl said. "So what's your weapon?"

"My weapon? I don't have a weapon," Libby said.

"What'cha been usin' ta kill Walkers?" Daryl asked.

"Walkers is what you call the dead people?" Libby asked.

"Yes, that's what we call them," Michonne responded.

"Whatever I can get my hands on," Libby said. "I had me a tater fork, but I left it in the barn with the kids when I went out ta try ta make sure y'all didn't steal my food."

"Where'd ya get the gun?" Daryl asked.

"It was my Pa's," Libby responded. "I had more of 'em, but we done used 'em up, so I left 'em when we used 'em up."

"You left 'em, huh? So you been on the move for a bit?" Daryl asked.

"Yeah, what's it to ya?" Libby asked.

"Just wonderin'," Daryl said. "We'll get ya somethin' as a weapon, whether ya decide to stay or not."

As they circled around the community and ended up back at headquarters, Daryl stopped.

"I reckon that's all there is to see, so what's it gonna be?" Daryl asked.

"Do you have any questions?" Michonne asked.

Libby squinted her eyes at Michonne.

"Yeah…why y'all wanta let us stay here when we ain't got nothin' ta give ya?" Libby asked.

Michonne thought about it a minute. She didn't know Libby's background, but she could understand that the girl might question their motives.

"You can work, can't you?" Michonne asked after a minute. "You could do something around here to help out, right?"

Libby considered it.

"Yeah, I reckon I could," she said.

"And Emma, she's old enough to help with the little ones, isn't she? Or do other things, maybe?" Michonne continued.

"Well, yeah," Libby said.

"And Jacob and Sam, they'll grow up and be able to help contribute too," Michonne said. "We can always use the extra hands around here. It takes a lot to keep this place running. Every one of us here started out not being part of this family, and every one of us here has found our place. If you stay, and you look for it, you'll find your place here too."

Libby considered it.

"I s'pose that's fair. We don't mind workin' fer keep," she said.

"Anything else you want to ask?" Michonne asked.

"Is he the boss 'round here?" Libby asked, pointing at Daryl.

Daryl snickered.

"I can tell ya that one. I ain't the boss around here. We ain't got no bosses. Everybody gets a say in all we do," Daryl said. "I'm just the one that tends to listen to all everyone's got to say an' figure out what's the way we gon' do things. Carol, she ain't the boss neither, but she keeps up with what needs to be done, so we listen when she tells us what we oughta do. There ain't nobody 'round here that's no more important than anybody else though. If'n you can learn to act like ya got the sense that God gave dirt then you'll have a say in what we do too. Same goes for the little ones when they can reason through it."

"Well said," Michonne said.

"So what's it gonna be?" Daryl asked again. "We ain't got all day for ya to make up ya mind. Not if'n you wanta get that house set up and comfortable before it gets too late, an' if ya goin' then ya best be hittin' the road before it gets any later than it is."

Libby considered him a moment. Then she considered Michonne.

Michonne didn't know if it was the fact that she was pregnant or the fact that she'd left her katana at the house, but Libby didn't seem to look at her with the initial look of fear that many of their new arrivals tended to regard her with.

"I reckon we'll stay," Libby said.

"Fine," Daryl said. "But you remember our deal. If you gon' stay, you can't be scrappin' with people for no good reason.

"I had a good reason!" Libby snapped back. "I told her not ta touch Sam an' she was still aimin' ta do it so I socked her one!"

"And I done told ya that Sadie can't hear not a damn thing, so no sockin' her for not respondin' to what ya say!" Daryl snapped back. "That ain't the way we do it around here no way!"

"Fine," Libby said, crossing her arms. "I said I was sorry. I ain't gonna hit nobody else 'less they really need it."

"You ain't gonna hit nobody else unless they're actually doin' somethin' to hurt you or someone else, not just 'cause you think they might do something," Daryl said. "Same thing goes with your weapons. They're for Walkers an' outside people that threaten you, not for the family."

"But y'all ain't my family," Libby said.

"Around here," Michonne said, "we all regard each other as family. That's just how it is. You'll get used to it, I promise. You might even learn to like it."

"We'll see," Libby said.

"Welcome to the family, Libby," Daryl said, a half smile on his face. "Now you better get to work gettin' your stuff together for the house. Just ask for help when ya need it and someone will be glad to help."

Libby didn't say anything, but she did start off in the direction of some of the empty houses, presumably in search of whatever items she had on her mind.

"Do you think they're going to fit in here, Daryl?" Michonne asked, watching Libby bound away.

"You know, 'Chonne, I ain't sure, but I think they might," Daryl responded. "Won't be the first time we've had ta make a square peg fit in a round hole 'round here."

Michonne snickered.

If there was nothing else that was true about their ever growing family, it was that everyone was unique. Maybe that's what made the community function the way it did. Every person came with their challenges, but they also seemed to always bring something new to the table. She liked to think that maybe there was a place there for Libby and her crew, and she was curious to see what they could do to enhance the life of the community.


	93. Chapter 93

**AN: As any of you still reading know, we've got a good many plot lines taking place "currently" in our story. That, of course, slows down the progression of the story until we've reached the end of those lines…or at least until some loose ends are tied up. That means that things move more slowly right now. **

**I squeezed this chapter in for everyone, and I hope you enjoy it. As we progress I'll be doing these as something like "episodes" that slowly move us forward in our plotlines. **

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"It's rainin' buckets out there," Daryl said.

"You're right, it is," Michonne said. She was sitting beside Daryl on the bed listening to the rain pounding against the roof. The rain had come upon them rather suddenly while several people were milling about moving furniture and such for Libby and her little family. They'd all had to move what they could at the last minute and abandon the rest of the mission for another day.

Daryl leaned over and kissed Michonne and she responded.

"I got somethin' for ya, 'Chonne," Daryl said when he broke away from the kiss.

"Oh?" Michonne asked. She couldn't imagine what Daryl had for her, so her curiosity was peaked.

"Yeah…well, it's kinda for me too," Daryl said. Michonne smiled when she saw him blush a little.

"What is it, Daryl?" Michonne asked.

Daryl crawled out of bed and walked over to where his pants were thrown over a chair in the corner. It was the only method of putting away clothes that Michonne could get Daryl to go along with. He fumbled around in the pockets for a minute and then stood there with his hands behind his back looking a little sheepish. Michonne was curious now.

"Well, I mean it ain't nothin' really, but I saw it when we was movin' some stuff that Maggie picked out for Libby an' Emma an' I thought I might get it," Daryl offered.

"What is it, Daryl?" Michonne repeated, trying to hide her amusement.

Daryl came back, crawling onto the bed and seating himself just to the side of her, facing her. He held out his hand and she took the item he had balled in his fist. When she examined it, she found it to be possibly the most hideous pair of earrings that she'd ever seen. She turned it over, looking at them for a minute.

"You like 'em?" Daryl asked.

Michonne considered her next move for a moment. The earrings were fake, very long, and covered in gaudy rhinestones. In a word, no, she didn't like them. She had no idea who in their right mind would like them. Then she looked back at Daryl's face, looking first at them and then back at her.

_Daryl liked them._

Suddenly Michonne was grateful that they didn't live any longer in a society where it would be not only acceptable, but expected, that Daryl buy her jewelry from time to time.

"What exactly made you decide to get these for me?" Michonne asked, skirting Daryl's question for a moment.

"You got them holes punched in your ears, 'Chonne, I figured you could wear 'em," Daryl said.

"I _can_ wear them, Daryl, but what made you decide to get them for me?" Michonne pressed. Daryl's face was one of concern, but she couldn't tell if he was upset or not.

"I thought they was pretty, 'Chonne," Daryl said. "I thought you might like to wear 'em for me."

Michonne smiled.

"So you got me these to wear for _you_, huh?" Michonne asked.

"Well, yeah," Daryl said. He chewed his lip and eyed her. Finally his facial expression dissolved from concern to irritation. Michonne had seen it before. He was bothered by her response, but he was about to be an ass about it to try and cover it up. She could see it coming even before he grabbed for the earrings. "Forget it," he growled. As he grabbed for them she snatched them out of his reach.

"Easy, Daryl," Michonne said. "I didn't say I wasn't going to wear your earrings."

Daryl sat back again and looked annoyed. Michonne tried hard not to smile at him. She looked at the hideous earrings again.

"Why do you like these earrings?" She asked.

Daryl shrugged. He was pouting now. She'd have to give in to his game soon if she wanted to salvage his mood for the evening.

"Is it because they're shiny, Daryl?" She asked.

In response Daryl bit at his thumbnail. The earrings were like the shirts, Michonne decided. She had acquired a veritable rainbow of shirts, all for Daryl's tastes. He didn't care what the shirts looked like, he didn't care if they fit. The only that that seemed to matter to him in these little scenarios that he created was that the color was right, or was as close to being right as she could manage to scrounge up. The earrings were no different. Daryl couldn't care any less what they looked like, what mattered here was that they were shiny, and apparently he wanted her to wear gaudy, shiny earrings for him.

_I'm married to a man with the same visual stimulation as a magpie_, Michonne thought. _If I wrapped myself in aluminum foil he'd probably lose his mind._

She got up out of bed slowly and started toward the bathroom carrying Daryl's treasure.

"What'cha doin'?" Daryl asked behind her.

"I'm cleaning these things with alcohol," Michonne said, digging through the box in the bathroom. "I have no idea where they've been and I'm not sure I want to know anything about the person who had them before. Besides, I haven't worn earrings in a while and if I'm going to stick these things in my ears I'd rather not get an infection from it."

Michonne cleaned the earrings and watched Daryl out of the corner of her eye. He was sitting on the bed watching her.

Michonne put on the earrings finally and grabbed a tie to tie up the dreadlocks that normally fell around her ears and face. She walked back into the bedroom, stopping beside the dresser to strip out of her underwear, the only thing that she was still wearing.

"What else do you want, Daryl?" Michonne asked, pulling open one of her drawers and fingering the various items inside.

"What'cha mean?" Daryl asked.

"What else do you want? Any certain shirt, underwear?" Michonne asked.

Daryl looked at her, barely even blinking.

"No, 'Chonne, nothin' else," he said.

"So you just want me to wear the earrings?" She asked.

Daryl nodded his head.

"I look kind of stupid just wearing these earrings, Daryl," Michonne said, though she realized that she looked pretty stupid wearing most everything that Daryl requested.

"No ya don't, 'Chonne, you look real fancy," Daryl said.

Michonne smiled and came over to the bed to join him. When she was situated, Daryl kissed her. When he pulled away his hand went to the one of the earrings, moving it just a little so that it glistened in the lamplight. He kissed her neck, sucking at it and she tipped her head back to allow him better access.

"I'm only wearing these in the bedroom," Michonne said, swallowing as he kissed her jaw. Daryl only grunted his understanding in response. His mouth trailed back to her neck and down her chest, his lips searching out her nipple. When he clamped down on it Michonne moaned. "You know," she panted, "I'm always dressing up for you, when are you going to dress up for me?"

Daryl stopped teasing her nipple with his tongue and looked at her.

"What'cha want me to dress up as?" He asked.

Michonne thought about it. The truth was that she really didn't want him to dress up as anything. She had just said that to tease him, and now he was waiting for a genuine response.

"Nothing, Daryl. I like you just the way you are," she said. She smiled at him and pulled him to her to kiss him again. Daryl didn't respond to the kiss, though. Instead he pulled away. "What?" Michonne asked. "What's wrong?"

"Take 'em off, 'Chonne," Daryl snapped. "I don't want'cha ta fuckin' wear 'em."

Michonne was taken aback by Daryl's tone almost as much as she was by his facial expression. He looked angry and hurt right now.

"Daryl, really, it's fine," she said. "What's wrong with you?"

"I like ya just the way ya is, 'Chonne, and I don't want ya thinkin' no different. Take the fuckin' things off," he growled. He made a grab and she moved, worried he might actually try to snatch one out of her ear. She'd never seen him act this way, not toward _her_. She felt her eyes brimming with tears without her permission and she tried to blink them back, swallowing the lump that was also rising in her throat.

"Daryl, what's wrong?" She asked. "I didn't mean anything. I know you like me like I am."

Daryl eyed her. Suddenly she wished she hadn't teased him at all. She wished she'd just put the earrings on and gone on with the evening as he'd obviously planned.

"I'm sorry, Daryl," she said, swallowing again. "I'm not taking them off. You like them, and it's fine that you like them. I shouldn't have teased you for it."

Michonne watched Daryl shift uncomfortably for a moment.

"Can you forgive me?" She asked, pushing him a bit.

"'Course I forgive ya, 'Chonne," Daryl said after a minute. "I just don't want ya thinkin' that I don't like ya like ya is, 'cause I do. I just wanted ta see what you'd look like wearin' them shiny earrings, that's all."

Michonne smiled then, even though the lump she'd been trying to swallow wasn't gone completely. She blinked and felt one of the tears escape.

"You just wanted to see what I'd look like when I was 'fancy', right?" She asked.

Daryl's nodded. His hand came up and he gently brushed her cheek, wiping away the escaped tear.

"Why ya cryin'?" He asked.

"It's nothing," Michonne said. "You just scared me for a second, that's all…when you grabbed at me."

Daryl looked worried then.

"I didn't mean to scare ya none, 'Chonne, honest. I wouldn't never hurt ya," Daryl said.

"I know you wouldn't," Michonne said. She took a deep breath and swallowed again. She wasn't upset anymore, but once the feeling had started it was difficult to get it to go away. "I know you wouldn't," she repeated. "Can we make love now, or do we have to keep fighting?" She asked after a second.

"You _can_ take 'em off, 'Chonne, if ya want to," Daryl offered.

Michonne smiled at him then.

"Oh, I'm _going_ to take them off, Daryl, but I'll let you have your fun first," she said.

"You sure there ain't nothin' you want me to do for ya?" Daryl asked.

Michonne smiled. She slid down in the bed, resting her head on the pillow. She grabbed his pillow and shifted her weight, putting it under her back.

"I said there wasn't anything I wanted you to put on," she said. "I didn't say there wasn't anything I wanted you to _do_ for me."

Daryl smiled at her now.

"What'cha thinkin' 'bout?" He asked.

Michonne smiled at him and spread her legs.

"Well, if I'm a fancy woman, we have certain expectations about how we should be treated," she said.

"Yeah?" Daryl asked, looking at her and grinning.

"Yeah, we do," Michonne said. "We like to be taken care of," she said. "So I guess if you're going to have a fancy woman then you'd best start taking care of her, don't you think?"

Daryl grinned. He moved then and repositioned himself, his mouth going back to her breasts. He teased them both for a moment and then licked a trail over her belly, making her shiver. He moved between her legs and teased her with his tongue. Michonne moaned and grasped at the sheets under her hands.

"This what'cha had in mind," Daryl asked, stopping for a moment before suckling at her. The only response that Michonne could wrestle up was to bury her hand in his hair. He stopped again for a second, the teasing only making it unbearable for her. "Ain't a bad trade, huh? That what'cha sayin'?" Michonne responded by tugging at his hair, guiding him back down.

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The rain showed absolutely no signs of letting up. Rick was alone in his house. Carl had trotted down to Beau's house some time back to do whatever it was the two of them did when they hung out like this. Beau had decided to remain in the same house he'd always been in once Carol had taken care of the smell and offered him something to put in his room that smelled nice, promising him that it was a very manly thing to have. Rick wasn't sure how it would go for Beau and Carl to spend the day cooped up in the house with the "wild ones", but Rick imagined that most everyone would know about it if anything happened that the two boys couldn't handle.

Across the street he could see that Sadie and Mark were occupying the porch. Occasionally they chatted, but mostly Mark was busy reading something while Sadie sat lazily rocking and gazing off at nothing. Rick decided he'd pay them a visit.

As Rick crossed the street, undeterred by the falling rain, he noticed that Mark got up from his spot and disappeared inside with the baby.

"Need some company?" Rick asked, coming up the porch steps.

"What?" Sadie asked. "You're all wet now," she said with a smile.

Rick smiled back at her.

"I am all wet," he said, "but it doesn't matter. Do you want some company?"

Sadie looked around and Rick wondered if she hadn't noticed that Mark had gone inside with the child.

"Sure," she said, shrugging.

Rick responded by walking around her and pulling the second rocker so that it was at an angle. He was almost beside her, but he was slightly angled toward her so that it would make conversation easier.

Rick was sure that he wanted to have a conversation with Sadie, but he really wasn't sure what he wanted to say. Right now he'd grasp at anything just to get it started.

"So, that's a nice shiner you got there," he said. "I guess it's true that you got in a fight with a kid?"

Sadie looked at him a moment as though she was considering what he had said, her head cocked slightly to the side. She nodded a little.

"She hit me," Sadie said. She shrugged. "I didn't know what she was going to do, but I wasn't going to just let her keep hitting me."

"Good strategy," Rick said. He reached up and gently put his hand on Sadie's jaw, directing her face more in his direction and turning it slightly, looking at the black eye. He found it strange. The black eye and the busted lip, battle scars from her cat fight the day before, did nothing to detract from her beauty. "You've got beautiful eyes," he said.

Sadie smiled at him then, but it wasn't a genuine smile, it was more of a smirk.

"And now you're going to kiss me?" She asked. Rick didn't know what to say for a moment. Her tone didn't exactly change much, and he wasn't certain if it was a genuine question or not, though the smirk on her face warned him that it might not be.

"Do you want me to kiss you?" He asked.

Sadie reached up and gently pushed his hand away from her face. She sat up, leaning toward him.

"I know about Rachel," she said.

"What about Rachel?" Rick asked. "We broke up," he offered.

Sadie continued to wear the same smirk.

"I know that too," she said. She was quiet for a minute, but her eyes never left his. She was staring at him intently. "Why did you break up? Because she wanted to be with Seth? What about you, Rick? What did you want?"

Rick stopped for a moment. It was hard to say exactly what he wanted. He couldn't put it into words when he wasn't certain of it himself. He liked Sadie. In the beginning it had simply been that he'd found her very attractive, unnervingly so at times, but now he thought it might be a little more. He found her intriguing. On many levels she was so readable, so open, so honest, but there was also something about her that was somewhat mysterious. He wondered if it was that mystery that drew him to her, that made him cross the street in the rain just to sit with a woman that may or may not engage in conversation with him.

"I don't know, Sadie," he answered. He decided the best thing was to be honest with her. She seemed to have some strange ability to read his mind anyway, so why should he lie and complicate the situation further? "I'm not always sure of what I want."

Sadie considered his answer a moment, sat back in her chair, and watched him.

"Do you know what you want?" He challenged.

Sadie smiled then.

"No, I don't," she responded. "Not anymore. I knew what I wanted before, but it's changed a lot since then."

"Hasn't everything changed?" Rick asked. He knew that if he saw himself now through the eyes that he'd once seen the world he wouldn't even recognize himself. He knew that he'd changed. He could see that the others in the group had changed. Those he had been with the longest were, at times, barely even shadows of the people they had been when they were outside of Atlanta. They all retained traces of the people they were, that much was certain, but the characteristics that remained the same seemed minimal at best. This world, their world, seemed to make them into entirely different animals.

Sadie nodded her head.

"It has changed, you're right," Sadie said. "I know, though, what I don't want. It seems like no matter how much I lose the ability to say what I want out of life…out of this life…I never lose the ability to say what I don't want."

"What is it that you don't want?" Rick asked.

"I don't want to be anybody's Rachel," Sadie said. She looked at him again, then, locking him in with her stare.

Rick realized what she was insinuating and he didn't quite know how to respond. He'd never intended for her to take the place of Rachel, at least not literally. He wasn't sure that he'd ever really thought that anything would actually happen between them. He suddenly felt as awkward as he'd often seen Daryl act. He cleared his throat.

"I…well, I wasn't expecting you to be Rachel," he offered.

Sadie smiled.

"Good," she said. "If I wanted to be like that, if all I wanted out of this life was someone to have sex with me, I would have kissed Beau back," she offered.

Rick had heard from Carl that Beau had kissed Sadie. Apparently she'd rejected the boy, placing him firmly in the position of a friend. Carl had told Rick that Beau had not taken the rejection lightly and that he harbored, at least to some degree, a little bitterness at her lack of enthusiasm about the kiss.

"If I wanted someone to just sleep with me," she continued, "then I could have molded the boy into someone who did everything I commanded, exactly as I wanted it done…but I didn't want that."

"I didn't come here to sleep with you, Sadie," Rick said after a minute, "and I didn't come here to be molded into anything. I came here to have a conversation with you." He paused for a minute and watched her watching him. "I don't know what I want, Sadie, and I don't know if I will ever know what I want, but I do know that I never wanted you to be Rachel."

Sadie looked satisfied then. She nodded and took a deep breath. A half smile crossed her face.

"Good," she said finally. "What do you want to have a conversation about, Rick?"

Rick realized that at least one elephant was out of the room. He wasn't sure what would happen from here out, but he knew where Sadie stood to some degree. She wasn't looking for a physical relationship, at least not a purely physical relationship. If he was going to get closer to her, it was going to take some effort to connect with her on a different level.

"Well," he said, trying to think of something to engage her in conversation about, "I've been spending more time with Judith lately. Do you think you might have any advice for me?"

Sadie smiled at him again. This time the smirk was entirely gone and the smile was the most genuine that she could offer.

"What do you need advice on?" She asked.

"Everything," Rick said. "You said you had five children and three of them were girls. Tell me what I need to know about little girls."

Sadie laughed.

"There's a lot to know about little girls," Sadie said. Rick recognized in her face that she was teasing him a little.

"We've got a while," he said. "The rain doesn't look like it's going to stop anytime soon."

He leaned back in his rocker then, establishing physically for her that he had no intention of leaving. She smiled and leaned back in hers, turning her head toward him. Rick decided then that nothing may ever happen between the two of them, but he was pretty sure he was going to enjoy seeing where this might go. He listened as she began to tell him about her daughters. He tried to soak it in, gathering from what she said anything that he might use to help establish a firmer relationship with Judith on the one hand, and anything that he might use to get closer to Sadie on the other.


	94. Chapter 94

"I don't like this game," Daryl protested. They'd only been attempting charades for about five minutes and already he was annoyed with it. "I don't even know half this shit no way."

It had been raining since the night before, and it seemed like the perfect night to have a game night if they were going to do it. Maggie, Glenn, Mark, and Sadie had joined them. The coffee table was moved out of the way and everyone was sitting in a circle on the floor except for Michonne. She had chosen to remain on the couch, arguing that she wasn't sitting on the hard floor when she didn't have to. She was cuddling Paul who was sleeping against her, sucking absently in his dreams.

"Fine, Daryl, we can play something else," Maggie said. "What do you want to play?"

"I think we've got Candy Land in there somewhere," Glenn offered. "That shouldn't be too hard for you. You could play with Hope and Judith, then you'd be sure to win."

"You think you're funny?" Daryl asked, throwing one of the rubber balls that was near him at Glenn. Judith and Hope, both of whom had been playing with the balls, went after it. Glenn caught the ball and held it out to Judith who took it with a "thank you" and immediately started trying to keep Hope from getting it.

"Well we know you like Twister," Maggie said.

"Ah! Twister! The game that's made public foreplay acceptable since the sixties, excellent choice," Mark said. He burrowed in the plastic container and came out with the box. "Anyone fancy a game? Daryl? Glenn?"

Both of them looked at him, but neither said anything. He grinned.

"No takers? Aren't y'all just wet blankets," Mark responded.

"Let's just play cards, then," Tyreese offered.

Everyone agreed and Mark went to rummaging in the box again. He dug out two decks of cards and tossed them at Glenn.

"Go fish?" Glenn asked. "At least everybody should know the rules to that one."

He started shuffling cards without waiting for a response. He shuffled them a little longer than he had to simply because he suddenly had Judith's unwavering attention. Watching his hands had mesmerized her to the point that she'd even given the ball over to Hope who took at went directly to Daryl, gaining access to his lap in an effort to get him to help her protect her newly acquired treasure.

"So Mark and I are planning something," Maggie said. "A soiree of sorts."

"What the fuck is that?" Daryl asked, picking up the cards that were appearing in front of him now.

"It's like a party," Michonne offered.

"We were talking about how rich all the people that must have lived here were," Mark said. "I mean you don't have hardwood floors throughout your house and marble everywhere else if you weren't pulling in a little more than minimum wage."

"And then we started thinking about all the closets we haven't even begun to raid and how many nice clothes we'd be able to find if we started some kind of organized search," Maggie said.

"So since Maggie has a little free time on her hands right now I suggested that she see what she could find. She can gather some stuff together and we'll suit everyone up. We could make dinner just a little bit nicer. Everyone can just sort of hang out afterwards, instead of rushing back home," Mark said. "It would also be a good excuse for some well needed haircuts," he said, cutting his eyes at Daryl and Glenn.

"I don't want to get all dolled up," Daryl protested.

"Oh come on, Daryl, it might be fun," Michonne said. "You do need a haircut, and I might like to see you all _fancy_.

Daryl glared at her and she smiled at him. She wasn't going to say anymore, but he knew what she was referring to, that much was clear.

"Got any fours?" She asked, deciding to start the game.

"Go fish," Daryl growled.

"You'll have to hand me a card," she responded. "I can't reach the deck and I'm not talented enough to pick one up with my toes."

Daryl handed her one of the cards.

"If ya ask me, sounds like a stupid idea," Daryl said. "It's silly."

"Of course it's silly," Carol said, "but silly doesn't mean it's a bad idea. I think it could be fun."

"I _know_ better than to say it's silly," Glenn said.

"Good boy," Maggie said. "Now give me all of your eights, and twos…"

"Do you want eights or twos?" Glenn asked.

"Both," Maggie said.

Glenn handed her some cards.

"Doesn't work that way, you only get twos," he said.

"Yes, but now we all know you have eights too, so I'll take those, please and thank you," Mark said.

Glenn sighed and handed him a card.

"Oh, and we're making the party a lady's choice party," Maggie said. "So if you make us mad, you could just end up without a date."

"Oh, now I like that," Michonne responded. "See, Daryl? If you won't get a haircut and put on some nice clothes for me then I'll just go with someone else."

"Who the hell ya gonna go with?" He asked.

"I could go with Mark," Michonne said.

"Then who's Sadie gonna go with?" Daryl asked.

"Mark gets all the girls," Glenn said.

"I can go with Hope then if ya don't want to go with me, 'Chonne. Hope ain't said not one thing about my hair or my clothes," Daryl said.

Michonne nudged him with her foot.

"Sadie gets to pick who she's going with," Mark said, leaning over Maggie to get Sadie's attention. She was the only one that appeared to be taking the card game seriously. "Sadie had a gentleman caller today," he said when she looked at him.

"Beau still barkin' up that tree?" Daryl asked.

"No, it isn't Beau," Mark said.

"Stop," Sadie said. "Rick came to talk to me. Just talk."

"Rick just talking?" Maggie said, exchanging cards with Carol. "That's sort of a new approach for him, isn't it? I mean it's a little different than it was with Rachel. We didn't even know there was anything going on there before they started their watchtower adventures."

"Watch what?" Sadie asked.

"Watch TOWER," Maggie said. "It's a long story. We used to live in a prison, someone was always on watch. Let's just say the watchtower saw a lot more than just people keeping watch."

Sadie raised her eyebrows and nodded.

"Well I'm not Rachel," she said. "And we don't have a watchtower."

Glenn started laughing, quietly at first, but then it continued to grow.

"What's so funny?" Carol finally asked.

"Oh my God! Sadie sounds like the only one of us with any morals right now," Glenn said, barely controlling his laughter. "Watchtowers, pharmacies, prison cells, barns, you name it and at least one of us has probably done it there."

"Orchards," Michonne said smirking at Carol.

"_Creeks_," Carol shot back.

"I don't think it has to do with morals," Mark said. "Get your lovin' when and where you can, am I right? Sadie's just a tease."

Sadie reached over Maggie then and swatted at Mark.

"I am not a tease!" She said.

Mark shook his head and tried to look as serious as he could for a moment.

"Poor Beau, you teased that poor boy and ruined him. It was probably the first piece he ever thought he was going to get…probably had his tastes all ready for it…and then you snatched it right out from under him without so much as a consolation prize," Mark said.

Nearly everyone howled at that. Michonne looked at Daryl who had turned beat red and was trying to cover Hope's ears, even though the girl was far more interested in trying to bite the oversized rubber ball she had than she was in any of the conversation.

"She's not listening, Daryl," Michonne said, nudging him. "Y'all better watch out, though. Judith is a sponge. No phrases you don't want to hear ringing through headquarters over breakfast."

"I didn't tease Beau," Sadie said.

"What's going to be worse is when she finally gets done playing cat and mouse with Rick and decides to give in. Then the poor boy is going to have to see Rick playing with the toy he wanted," Mark said.

"Ok," Glenn said, "this conversation has gone bad. It's gone very…very bad. I can't even look at Sadie right now and I don't think I want to look at Beau or Rick for a while."

Daryl got up, picking Hope up with him.

"I'm puttin' my kid to bed before y'all get any rowdier down here," he said. He leaned over and let Michonne kiss Hope.

"I'll come with you, Daryl. I can put Judith down for Carol and Hope's not going to go to sleep without milk. She hasn't had any tonight, and I don't think you've got any magic tricks that I don't know about," Michonne said getting up. She passed a still sleeping Paul to Sadie, the baby stirring a little.

"Is that our cue to leave?" Maggie asked.

"Not hardly," Michonne said. "It's just the two of us taking an intermission. Y'all keep going…you know prizes, toys, _pieces_ of things…I'm sure we'll catch right back up."

Michonne gathered up Judith who had decided to start her pre-bed cuddling in Tyreese's lap. The girl began to protest bedtime, a new hobby of hers, but Michonne ignored her. She followed Daryl up the stairs and left behind the conversation that had begun to pick up again.

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When everyone had finally gone home it was much later than usual. Michonne knew that if the rain didn't earn them an extra day of vacation they'd all be tired the next day. The conversation had been hilarious though, and they'd all dared to tell more than one secret about themselves leaving everyone blushing a time or two, especially Daryl.

Michonne hadn't told any real secrets on him, but she'd teased him all night like she was going to. It had been just enough to worry him, and the conversation had been just enough to get her wanting to stay up a little longer.

"If you wasn't pregnant, I'd beat you woman," Daryl said, just after he closed the bedroom door. "Threatening to tell everyone about me likin' it when ya put on things for me."

He reached out and grabbed her, pulling her to him. She could easily tell by the look on his face that he wasn't angry at all.

"I didn't tell them anything, Daryl Dixon," Michonne responded. She pulled a little loose from his grip and playfully swatted at him. "And don't you even say that you'd beat me because you and I both know that's a lie!"

Daryl grinned at her.

"OK, so I wouldn't beat'cha, but I _would_ throw you over my lap and spank you for being bad like you was," Daryl said.

"Now _that_ I might not be opposed to," Michonne said, biting her lip. "Pregnant or not."

Michonne could see that Daryl clearly didn't know where to go from here. He just swallowed and looked at her, a little uncomfortable.

"Could be fun," Michonne urged. She started toward the bed, stripping off her shirt and bra as she went. When she sat on the bed, shimmying out of her pants, she chuckled a little at Daryl still standing there, looking conflicted. "Come on over here, Daryl, teach me a lesson about teasing you in public," she said.

Daryl shuffled forward a little and Michonne fought with herself. She was barely holding back the desire to laugh at his facial expression.

"Ain't gon' hit ya, 'Chonne," he finally said, reaching the edge of the bed, but not getting anywhere close to her.

"Well no, Daryl, I didn't expect you to wail on me," Michonne said. "I'd have to kick your ass if you did that, but a little playful spanking never hurt anyone."

Daryl swallowed again. Michonne thought he might run away. She sighed.

"OK, fine, you don't have to do it, Daryl. Not if it's going to make you uncomfortable. I just thought you might enjoy it is all. I thought it might be exciting…" Michonne sighed again and ran her hand across the blanket. "But if you just want to keep doing the same boring things, I guess that's fine too," she looked up at Daryl.

"That ain't even fair," Daryl said after a second. "Don't be givin' me them damn doe eyes like you ain't doin' nothin'. You tryin' to make me feel bad now just 'cause I don't want ta hit ya!"

"That's because I'm not talking about hitting me, Daryl! I'm talking about having some fun together, I'm talking about trying something _different_," Michonne said, irritated.

"You wanna do somethin' different, fine, but I don't want ta hit ya and I ain't gonna do it. You're always doin' that, 'Chonne. You're always tryin' to make me do things I don't wanna do, like dressin' up for that stupid ass party that Maggie came up with," Daryl said, raising his voice.

"What did you just say to me?" Michonne responded back, raising hers to meet his. "Me? I'm _always_ trying to make you do stuff that you don't want to do? Maybe if you weren't such a kid about everything I wouldn't have to work so hard to convince you that you might actually _like_ things. I think I'd like to see you dressed up _once_ to go to dinner with me and you can't just agree to that? You have to put me in a position where I've got to beg you to do it, but I'm supposed to be like your own personal paper doll or something and wear whatever you want me to wear so you can fuck me? God forbid I suggest something that might be a turn on to me because then I've got to coddle you and feel like I'm trying to get a six year old to eat his vegetables."

"I ain't no fuckin' kid!" Daryl shouted. "Don't fuckin' call me one! You hate wearin' shit so damn much then don't fuckin' wear it. Don't do me no damn favors!"

Michonne got up then and started found her underwear. She slipped back into it and got up, storming toward the dresser.

"Where you think you're goin' all halfcocked?" Daryl growled. "You better not be doin' nothin' stupid, Michonne!"

Michonne pulled on one of the oversized shirts she used as a night gown on the nights she bothered to put anything on and turned around.

"That's another damn thing," she yelled. "Stop fucking treating _me_ like I'm an idiot. I'm _pregnant_, Daryl, not mentally disabled. I'm not made of glass, I'm not helpless, and I'm not stupid! For the last six months you and Carol and everybody else have treated me like I don't have enough sense not to drown in the rain and I _hate _it. I have hated every damn minute of it. I cannot _wait_ for this baby to be out of me so maybe I can be treated with more respect than you give Judith!" Michonne could see that Daryl was boiling mad, and she didn't care because she was angry enough to explode.

"What you mean you don't get no respect? I fuckin' worship you most a' the damn time, what else do you want from me? You needed a safe place an' I fuckin' got that for _you_! I have busted my ass tryin' ta come up with ways to get you every damn thing you've needed and now you're fuckin' actin' like some kinda spoiled _brat_ 'cause I don't want ya to do stupid shit an' get your ass hurt or get the baby hurt?" Daryl barked back.

"Oh aren't you just my knight in shining armor," Michonne growled. "You did it all for me? _You_, Daryl, _you_ did all this, just for _me_? My fucking hero!"

Michonne started for the door and Daryl crossed the room quickly. She froze just as he reached out toward her arm.

"Don't you put your hands on me," she warned.

"Where the hell you think you goin'?" Daryl asked.

"I'm going to sleep on the couch, Daryl," Michonne spat. She realized now that she was breathing heavily and her heart was pounding.

"Don't do that, 'Chonne," Daryl said. He looked like he was calming down, but Michonne was still just as mad as she was before. "I'll go sleep on the couch if ya want me to, but stay up here."

"No, Daryl," Michonne replied. "I do _not_ want you to sleep on the couch! Then you'll just lord that over my head too."

She turned heading back to the bed.

"What'cha doin' now?" Daryl asked. She felt even more infuriated for a moment because it was like Daryl had suddenly calmed down. Like now it was all over for him and it was supposed to just be all over for her.

"I'm getting my pillows," she said. She stopped and turned around. "You know what, never mind. I'm not getting them. That would just be _spoiled_ of me." She stomped past Daryl and started down the stairs.

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Tyreese and Carol sat side by side in the bed, in the dark. When they'd first gotten to their room they'd both been a little turned on by the racy conversation of the evening, but when the world war had started up across the hall they'd both lost interest. Now they were both half-dressed and wondering what exactly had started the battle.

"Daryl's going to be a mess when he calms down," Carol said finally. "You're going to have to talk to him."

"What am I supposed to say to him, Carol? Sounds like they both gave it and they both got it," Tyreese said. "I guess that's fair enough."

"Do you think it was serious?" Carol asked.

"It _sounded_ serious," Tyreese offered.

"But do you think it was serious like 'give it a day' or do you think it was serious like 'start cleaning out another house'?" She asked.

Tyreese chuckled.

"I think it was just a marital spat," Tyreese said.

"I've never heard them fight like that before," Carol said.

"Well, we're comfortable here, and they've been together long enough to get up under each other's skin, it was bound to happen," Tyreese said.

"Daryl could drive anyone crazy," Carol said, chuckling.

"Michonne can be a real peach too, you know," Tyreese said. "Don't worry, Carol, they'll get through this. If they're on their second child I supposed they deserve to have their first fight. At least it didn't sound like anything got broken."

"Do you think we're going to start fighting?" Carol asked.

Tyreese chuckled.

"Oh I'm sure we'll have our day, just not tonight, OK?" He responded.

"Not enough couches," Carol said.

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Michonne was finally starting to calm down and was regretting most of what she had said. She was still angry at Daryl for what he had said, but this wasn't her first fight, and she knew well enough that this was just how things went sometimes and that though they'd both meant, at least to some degree, what they'd said, their delivery could have used some improvement.

Michonne shifted, trying to get comfortable. Admittedly she now wished she hadn't insisted on being the one to sleep on the couch, but she had too much pride to go and admit that now.

She wasn't entirely surprised, though, when Daryl showed up a few minutes later, carrying one of the lamps, with a pillow and blanket tucked under his arm.

"Brought ya your pillow," Daryl said, putting the lamp on the coffee table that had been restored to its place after the gathering.

"It was such a nice night," Michonne said, taking the pillow from him.

Daryl sat on the coffee table and it creaked a little.

"So does this mean ya don't love me no more?" Daryl asked.

"Does it mean that you don't love me?" Michonne countered.

Daryl chewed his lip.

"'Course I still love ya," he said.

"And I still love you…" Michonne responded.

"I didn't mean to call ya spoiled, 'Chonne," Daryl said after a minute.

"Just because you didn't mean to say it doesn't mean you didn't mean it," Michonne said. "And maybe you're right. Maybe we're all getting a little spoiled here. I mean it's easier to be comfortable here than it has been anywhere since this happened." Michonne paused a minute. "I'm sorry I called you a kid," she said.

Daryl nodded his head slightly.

"Maybe I'll go to Maggie's stupid party," Daryl said. "If ya still wanna go with me…if you want to see me dressed up, then I reckon I owe it to ya 'cause I made you wear so much stuff that ya don't like."

"I don't really mind all of it," Michonne said. "But I would like to see you all cleaned up. You didn't even dress up when we got married."

"Neither did you," Daryl countered. "Nobody did."

"Exactly, so this could be our chance to dress up for each other," Michonne said. "It's just for one evening, it won't kill you."

"I reckon not, 'Chonne," Daryl said. He was quiet for a moment and then he sighed. "Fuck it, I don't know what I'm doin' here 'Chonne, so is we done fightin' now or what?"

"I'm too tired to fight anymore," Michonne said.

"You wanna come back to the bedroom now? Or you want this blanket?" Daryl asked.

Michonne lie there for a minute, considering her options. Finally she reached her hand out to Daryl and he pulled her up. She grabbed her pillow and started back upstairs with him following along behind her with the lamp.


	95. Chapter 95

**AN: OK, sorry, I've been on hiatus. I had to take a little break, find the muse again. **

**I've been working on one of my other fics that's been popular, but I'm missing my friends here and I'm ready to come back. It may take me a little to get totally back into feeling it, so if this chapter isn't 100% great, please forgive me. I'm just falling back into things, but I promise I'm not running away again. I'll try and have another chapter for you in a few days at most.**

**I hope you're still with me and you're still enjoying the story. As always, I love to hear your comments, so drop me a line and let me know what you're thinking! **

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Tyreese knew that Daryl was in a mood. Even though the fight the night before had apparently been resolved, since no one had been on the couch when he'd gone downstairs early with Carol to carry firewood for her and show her the ash box that he'd built to her specifications, but resolution or not it had soured Daryl's mood and made his temper shorter than it typically was.

Tyreese had gone down to look over and map out their future project before he started recruiting all the hands he needed. While he was down there, Sadie showed up to ask what she should do and he put her to work, and now he was headed back in search of Daryl when he heard the commotion. Coming upon the scene, he was sure that the fences around the community were strong because surely every Walker in the area was trying to get in them right now.

"You ain't doin' nothin' but makin' a fuckin' mess!" Daryl protested.

"For your information, Daryl Dixon, I am making lye water, and your filthy ass will be grateful for that when we run out of soap because it's not going to last forever!" Carol snapped back.

They were squared off at each other, and Michonne was nowhere in sight. Tyreese wasn't sure if he should break them up or watch the rest of the fight. To add to the confusion, Judith was lying, sprawled on the grass, and crying about some woe in her life.

"Can I help you two?" Tyreese finally called, deciding that keeping Carol and Daryl from engaging in fist to fist combat was probably the first thing that he should do.

"I think we've got it just fine," Carol said. "Daryl here has his ass on his shoulders and thinks that I should be _doing_ something instead of just wasting time over here trying to follow some stupid pioneer guide to make cleaning supplies."

Daryl was chewing his thumb in silence, brooding.

"How the fuck was I supposed to know that's what you was doin'?" He spat finally.

"You weren't supposed to ask! I don't think I need a lecture from you on the fact that there are things that need to be done around here! I think I _understand_ that!" Carol shouted back.

"OK, OK," Tyreese said. "That's enough. Carol, finish with your soap, Daryl, I'm ready for you so we can get started."

Daryl eyed Carol for a minute, but she stood there, hands on her hips, like she was waiting for him to say something else.

"Man, fuck you too," Daryl grumbled at no one in particular. He picked up the tools that he'd been carrying and walked away.

Tyreese turned back to Carol a minute before following him.

"What is wrong with Judith?" He asked.

"She's fine," Carol huffed. "I put concentrated lemon juice on her hands so her fingers taste nasty and now she's practicing for her Oscar. Apparently everyone is feeling dramatic today."

Tyreese could tell that she was in the mood to be "feeling" very dramatic herself, so he decided not to push it. He walked past the toddler who stopped crying for a second and sat up. Upon seeing that he wasn't going to rescue her from her wretched state, she dropped dramatically back to the grass and resumed her screeching.

Tyreese caught up with Daryl walking down the street.

"So did you want to talk about it?" Tyreese asked, "I know having a fight with a woman can be difficult, but it's not the end of the world."

Daryl stopped and turned, eyeing him. He didn't say anything. Finally he just turned and continued walking.

"Ain't got nothin' ta talk about," Daryl said.

"Then why were you after Carol?" Tyreese asked. "She's been reading books for weeks trying to figure out this lye soap business, I even had to build her that ash box. She was really excited about telling everyone when she had it figured out."

"Ain't got nothin' to do with her neither. I didn't know what the hell she was doin' with all them ashes and water, and 'round here seems like people are forgettin' that winter's comin' an' there's still a whole lotta shit that's gotta be done 'fore it gets here," Daryl said.

"I think everyone knows there's a lot to be done, Daryl. Most everyone is working right now," Tyreese offered.

"Maggie an' Mark are goin' on about parties like we ain't got enough to do to keep busy," Daryl said.

Tyreese chuckled to himself.

"Maggie is going around looking for clothes and things for the party, yes, but the last I saw Mark he was mending clothes and watching Paul and Hope so that Carol could make the soap, Sadie would be free for work, which I already put her to doing while I came to get you, and Michonne could do whatever it is that she's doing," Tyreese said.

"I don't know what she's doin', probably somethin' stupid," Daryl growled.

Tyreese chuckled again.

"Listen, we heard your little battle, Daryl, so if you want to talk about it, let's just get it over with. It would be a lot easier for everyone working today if you're not snapping at everyone," Tyreese said.

Daryl didn't respond. When they finally got to their destination, Rick was standing to the side talking to Sadie, who was leaning on a sledge hammer.

"You two supposed to be workin', not talkin'," Daryl said, walking up.

Rick turned and raised his eyebrows. Sadie turned when Rick turned, being none the wiser to Daryl's words.

"Good morning to you too, sunshine," Rick said. "Sadie was just explaining to me what we're supposed to be doing, but now that the foreman's here, I guess you can handle it."

"You'll have to forgive Daryl's attitude, Rick, he's just discovered what marital spats are like, and he seems to think that means he needs to spread the love around to everyone," Tyreese said.

"Man, shut the fuck up!" Daryl said.

Sadie, apparently not having any interest in the conversation, heaved up her sledgehammer and started back inside to the job that she had halted when Rick had asked what he needed to do.

"We need to figure out how to take out enough of this wall so that we can frame it up as a door," Tyreese explained to Rick, ignoring Daryl for the moment. "We're going to leave as much intact as possible, saving ourselves whatever extra labor we can. Sadie's already working on the inside, so once we get this part figured out we can recruit more hands to handle the little pieces. This is going to be our hardest part, I think. Whatever we do, we don't want to compromise the structure."

Rick and Daryl both followed Tyreese and started helping him as he pointing out what he wanted them to do bit by bit, all of them understanding that this was an experiment at best.

"So did you and Michonne have a fight or something?" Rick asked, smirking.

"I ain't gossipin' with you two like a bunch a' hens," Daryl said.

"They did have a fight," Tyreese said. "I think it's the first one, and our boy Daryl, here, doesn't quite know how to take it."

"She called me a fuckin' kid," Daryl said. "And she's bitchin' just 'cause I don't want ta do stupid shit like this party they plannin'. We got enough goin' on that we don't need to be wastin' time with stuff like that. I told her I'd do it, but I don't think it makes any sense."

Rick chuckled.

"So you told her you'd do it, huh?" Rick said. "So are you mad about the fight, or mad because she won the fight?"

"She ain't won the fight!" Daryl said. "I just said I'd do it to be nice to her."

"Daryl, any man with a woman in his life has given into something to stop a fight or to end one, there's no shame in that," Tyreese said. "Am I right, Rick?"

"He's right," Rick said. "If you've only had one good fight with Michonne, and you've already got Hope and she's walking around looking like she's smuggling some kind of melon in her shirt, then I'd say you're doing pretty good for yourself. When Lori was pregnant with Carl I think we fought pretty much every day."

Daryl huffed and stopped tearing at the board he was trying to pull lose for a moment, wiping his forehead.

"I supposed you don't care about gettin' all gussied up for some stupid party?" Daryl asked, turning to Tyreese.

"No, I don't," Tyreese said, working his own crowbar into place. "I look at it this way, I get cleaned up and dress up. Carol gets cleaned up and dresses up. In return, I get to ogle her all evening while I hang out with people I was going to hang out with anyway, she gets all hot and bothered over the idea of me dressed up, and then I get to take her home. What exactly is supposed to be the down side of this?"

"And I'm dressing up and _hoping_ for an invitation to escort someone," Rick said. "You should be happy that you get the chance to go with Michonne. It's not like it's going to be something terrible."

Daryl didn't say anything for a moment, but he went back to work. Finally he paused again.

"Fine, but we're gettin' home before you an' Carol get there," Daryl said.

"I'll take that challenge," Tyreese said, chuckling.

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Beau had gone hunting just after breakfast. He came back with his prey, nothing to be especially proud of, in his opinion, and he cleaned it for Carol, dropping it off at headquarters. He headed back to his house to drop off his bow, thinking that he'd head down to the other end of the community after that to see what he could involved in. There were always things that needed to be done, it was just a matter of finding out where they wanted you.

As Beau climbed the steps to the house and tore open the front door, he was surprised. His door was gone…or rather, it wasn't so much that it was gone, as that it was covered up.

Beau stood there a minute, confused. He tried to figure out what had happened. Clearly someone had boarded up the door to his house, and they'd done it from the inside.

_Libby_.

Beau went around to the window and found that one of them was boarded, so he quickly ran to the other. It wasn't boarded, so he tried to get it open. Surprisingly it gave way and opened up. He climbed through it.

"Libby?! Libby?! What'cha done gone an' done to tha door?" He called out.

Libby appeared in front of him a moment later with a hammer in her hand.

"Fuck's it look like I done?" She said. "Ain't safe havin' 'em like they was an' I ain't just waitin' 'round here for them nasty assholes ta come an' get us. We just sittin' like ducks on a pond."

Beau walked through the house, finding that she'd also boarded the other door to the outside and, from what he could tell, all the downstairs windows except the one.

"How we s'posed ta get in an' out like this?" He asked.

"Ya got in, didn'tcha?" She answered.

"Ya know we safe here, don't'cha Libby? We ain't got no Walkers here. I'd say you's 'bout the biggest threat we got 'round here right now," Beau said.

Libby was a scrapper, so he kept his eye on the hammer in case she had half a mind to whack him with it. The other kids weren't so bad, at least not when she let them out of the room, but she typically kept them closed in there under the impression that she was protecting them from something.

"We safer now," Libby said. "Ain't nothin' safe, though, ain't'cha seen what them things can do?"

Beau wrinkled his brow at her. Since Mark had chopped at her hair while she was fighting him trying to get her cleaned up, she looked like an angry pixie. Beau had agreed to keep living with her, and he'd gotten her to talk to him just a little, but nothing more than this type of conversation where he spent most of his time trying to figure out what she was thinking.

"'Course I seen what they do, we all seen what they do. That's why we got this here place like we got, an' that's why we all aimin' ta keep from havin' ta move on, but I don't reckon we really gotta have the door all closed up like that," Beau said. "Ya been outside, ya been ta the fields. Ya know it's safe."

"Well ya ain't takin' it down," Libby said, squaring off with him. "We gotta sleep in here, an' I ain't waitin' for 'em ta come in the middle of the night and take my whole family!"

Beau sighed. He didn't want to fight with this girl, and he supposed that climbing in and out of the window wasn't that big of a deal, not if it was going to keep her from going crazy. At least she would leave the house now, sometimes, so he might as well let her board up the door if it was that important to her.

"Fine," he said, "but ya gotta leave that window alone."

Beau didn't wait for any response from her. He started up the stairs and left his bow in his room. When he came back down, she was gathering up the scraps that she had left over from her project.

"Where ya goin'?" She asked as he started back through the window.

"Got work ta be done. Ya better put all that stuff back where ya got it," he said, ducking through the window.

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Michonne knew that Daryl was still irritated about the fight. She was still a little bothered herself. She'd stayed away from him most of the day, clearing Walkers away from the fence lines and helping a little down at the fields. He'd been involved with starting the project to build a barn for the animals. She'd watched it from a distance for a few minutes, from time to time, to see the progress that was being made, but it was a job she knew better than to volunteer to help with so as to not ruffle his feathers any further.

She'd be allowed to help with the "indoor rabbit farm" they were planning in another house, at least to some degree, since it would be a much easier project, but the construction work they were doing at the time would definitely be something that Daryl would not deem "safe" for her to do.

When Michonne finally came through headquarters and accepted dinner, she found Daryl already sitting down eating with Hope in a high chair beside him. Hope called to her the minute that she walked through the door, but Daryl didn't look up.

Michonne walked over and kissed Hope, pointing at her plate and telling her to eat. She knew the little girl was happy to see her after she'd been away from her most of the day, and most probably she wanted to have a discussion with her about obtaining some milk, but even though Michonne's breasts ached she wasn't in the mood to feed her just yet.

"Can I sit here, sir, or is this seat taken?" Michonne asked, standing next to Daryl.

"What the hell's all that about, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked, looking up with a wrinkled forehead.

Michonne smiled at him.

"So you _are_ talking to me," she said.

"I'm talkin' to ya," he said. "Sit down and eat."

Michonne sat down beside Daryl, leaving him closest to Hope, and ate her dinner. She kept stealing glances at Daryl who was primarily focused on his food, taking breaks from time to time to offer a bite of this and that to Hope. Daryl didn't really look mad anymore, not quite like he had looked over breakfast, when she'd really realized that he was sulking. Now he just looked tired more than anything. She imagined that the barn construction had probably been a lot.

Michonne slipped her left hand up under the table and rested it on Daryl's leg. He glanced at her sideways a little. She smiled a little at him, and slid her hand up his thigh.

"Stop that," he growled in a whisper.

Michonne simply took another bite of food in response, and slid her hand up a little more. She could see that Daryl was bothered by it, but not really in a bad way. She left her hand where it was until she'd finished her dinner. Without saying anything, she got up and took her plate. She reached and took Daryl's plate as well. When she returned from the kitchen, she picked up Hope and asked Daryl if he was ready to go home. He grunted his goodnight to everyone and they made their way outside.

"What the hell was that, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked when they were walking down the sidewalk.

"What?" Michonne asked.

"First we fightin' last night an' then ya go and do that _where anybody coulda seen_ tonight?" Daryl asked.

They mounted the porch steps and Michonne was quiet until they closed the door, stepping inside. She waited for Daryl to light one of the lamps they kept near the door and hand it to her.

"Daryl, I'm going to teach you a little something about married life," Michonne said, "that is, if you want to learn it."

"What?" Daryl asked. Michonne could tell that he was bothered, or confused. She smiled.

"The only good thing about fighting," she said softly, "is when you decide to make up."

Daryl narrowed his eyes at her. She leaned in, kissing him. As she pulled away from him, she snagged his bottom lip with her teeth and tugged at it.

Daryl grinned.

"Ya mean what I think ya mean, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked.

"You just go upstairs and think about how you want to make it up to me while I feed Hope and think about what I'm going to do to make it up to you," Michonne said. She started up the stairs with Hope, leaving Daryl dumbstruck for a moment.


	96. Chapter 96

"Maggie, couldn't you find anything…well, anything that _fits_ a little better?" Carol asked.

"That fits just fine," Maggie answered, zipping Sadie into her dress.

Most of the women of the community had crowded into the upstairs of Glenn and Maggie's house. Some were trying on dresses with Maggie, some were being sized with Beth, and others were trying on dresses that had already been resized.

Michonne sat to the side, entertaining Hope and Judith who marveled at the dresses and tried to get the attention of the various women. It had been a week since Maggie and Mark announced at breakfast that they were planning their big soiree, and it was one week until the event was supposed to take place. Each evening, after dinner, the women had gone to try on various dresses, pick out the ones they wanted, try them on for sizing, and try them on again after they'd been worked on. Some of them were already done, like Michonne, while others still had a lot of work to go through before they were ready. Mark reported that the men had been much easier to get ready, and mostly all that was left to be done for them were haircuts and shaves.

"Maggie, I look like a prostitute," Carol protested.

"Why, Carol? Because the skirt doesn't go to your ankles?" Maggie asked. She turned away from Sadie then and looked at Carol. Michonne thought the whole thing was humorous. Most of them were pretty easy to please. The dress that Maggie found for her was perfect, in her opinion, since it was tight just under her breasts and loose and flowing everywhere else. Even if she decided to expand some in the upcoming week, the most it would do would raise the skirt a little. Carol wasn't pleased, however with the dress that Maggie had chosen for her, even though it was actually a very nice black cocktail dress.

"You look good in it, leave it alone," Michonne said.

"It needs to come in some more," Maggie said.

"You want it too tight _and_ too short?" Carol said.

"It's not too short," Michonne said. "And I don't think it needs to come in. I think we just need to force Carol to eat double her normal rations for the next week. It'll be good for her, good for the dress, and good for Tyreese."

Carol shot her a look and she simply responded with the sweetest smile that she could muster up.

"I'm with Michonne," Maggie said. "It's operation fatten you up for the rest of the week."

Maggie turned then to some of the others. She and Beth had finished their dresses early so as to not have to worry about them. Now they were focusing on everyone else.

"How am I supposed to go getting dinner ready for everyone dressed in this thing anyway," Carol said.

"Give it up, Carol. You're wearing the dress and you're going to fill it out if we have to get someone to hold you down while you're force fed. You're not serving dinner. Stella here has graciously offered to accompany Mark and help him both with dinner as well as with the children, should you want them to watch them," Maggie said. She had moved on and was checking over Beth's shoulder as she pinned some seams for Chelsea's dress.

"What?" Carol asked, walking over so that Michonne could unzip her. "You should be having fun at the gathering!"

Stella smiled.

"Don't worry, I'll be having fun," Stella said. "Besides, it's more of a couple's thing and since Dominique, I guess I just don't really feel like looking for that anymore. Mark's a lot of fun, and he doesn't have anyone to go with either, so we're going together. I asked him four days ago."

Stella smiled, but it was clear in her face that she still had not gotten over Dominique's death. These days it was typical to accept death, and accept it quickly, but everyone tucked it away, folded it up and put it neatly in their pockets, and they carried it with them to take it out and deal with it little by little as they felt that they could or as they felt they had time to. It was evident that Stella wasn't done dealing with the loss of her companion.

Carol smiled and nodded slightly.

"Well then thank you for the vacation," she said. "I hope you two still find the time to have a little fun."

"We will," Stella said. "We'll be busy talking about everyone else."

"How about you, Chelsea," Michonne spoke up, "who did you decide to invite to the soiree?"

Chelsea turned a little, ignoring Beth's protests that she hold still or risk being poked by pins.

"I asked Jimmy. We're just going as friends, though. I mean I don't think that he's really ready to start talking to anyone else. It wasn't easy on him, losing Sasha, but at least we can go together so that we're not just getting dressed up to go alone," she replied. "I guess it's about like going to the prom with your cousin, isn't it?"

"You didn't ask Beau?" Maggie asked.

"I did," Chelsea said, "but he said he had other plans, so I guess that was his way of saying he didn't want to go with me."

"That's because he's waiting on Sadie to ask him," Carol said. Sadie, who was busy changing back into her clothes, satisfied with her dress, wasn't paying them any attention. Carol tapped her on the shoulder and she turned, still fumbling with the buttons on her shirt. "You still haven't asked anyone yet?"

"No," Sadie responded. "I'm not asking anyone."

"Beau wouldn't go with Chelsea because he was waiting on you to ask someone so he'd know if you were going to ask him or not," Carol said.

"Well I'm not," Sadie said.

"So you're just going alone?" Carol asked.

"No, I'm taking Paul," Sadie said.

Carol rolled her eyes.

"Alright, I agree with Mark now, you're just a tease. You've got two people hanging on the line and you won't make a move either way," Carol said.

Rachel, who was listening to the whole thing and admiring herself in the mirror that Sadie had abandoned to change her clothes, spoke up then.

"It's not like they're really going anywhere anyway, I mean why not have a little fun with them?" She said.

"I don't feel sorry for Rick," Carol said, heaving Judith up on her hip, "don't get me wrong there, but I do feel sorry for Beau. The poor boy just won't give up hope."

"Is that my fault?" Sadie asked. She made a face at Carol.

"It's not your fault, no, not really, but I do feel sorry for him, just the same," Carol responded. She turned to Michonne. "Are you ready to go? The boys are going to be expecting us. Maggie, we'll send Glenn home in a little while."

Michonne gathered up Hope and the two of them bid goodnight to those that were still hanging out, enjoying the preparations for the party.

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"What I don't understand, Rick," Daryl said, holding up one of the boards that Tyreese instructed him to hold while he hammered, "is why ya just don't ask her if she's got a mind to invite ya instead of walkin' 'round here watchin' every move she makes like she's in heat an' ya wonderin' if she's gonna get close enough to get some tail."

Rick dropped the boards he was bringing over near Daryl's feet.

"Watch out! Ya 'bout dropped them damn things on my feet!" Daryl said.

"I'm not watching her like she's a dog," Rick said. He chuckled. He knew that Daryl and Tyreese, now secure in their own relationships were just giving him a hard time because he was the only single one of them left. Some of the younger boys were single, that much was true, but he was the only one in their circle not tied up with anyone, and it just so happened that the one that he'd set his sights on wasn't exactly playing easy. "Besides, you two got it easy."

Daryl scoffed.

"You reckon Sadie's a bigger handful than 'Chonne is?" He asked.

"Well tell me, Daryl, how much effort did you put into getting Michonne's attention exactly?" Rick asked. Daryl chewed his lip but didn't respond.

"You see, that's what I thought, Daryl. Michonne wasn't making you chase her. And Tyreese, you've got Carol. She's nice to everyone," Rick argued.

"Hey now!" Tyreese said. "I want credit for my conquests. Carol didn't exactly come running after me. I had to sneak up on her, earn her trust. I supposed that's just about as hard as doing a little chasing."

"Fine then, what do you propose I do?" Rick asked. As much as he hated to ask the two smirking smartasses in front of him for advice, he wasn't really sure what to do about Sadie. She spoke to him, she smiled at him, and she'd have a conversation with him just about any time he wanted to have one, but as of yet he didn't feel that they'd progressed any further than friends, despite his efforts to ask her about herself, her family, her interests before all this, anything that might show he was interested.

"Maybe you oughta make a little show for her, you know, some kind of mating dance," Daryl said. He snickered. "Works for most animals."

"Thank you, Daryl, for that absolutely useless input," Rick said.

"Man, how the fuck did'ja get Lori, then? You know more about this shit than I do, 'Chonne's the first woman I ever really had," Daryl said.

"That was a long time ago, Daryl, and a lot different. Lori came after me more than I went after her," Rick said.

"Try being charming," Tyreese said. He smiled. "You know, turn on the charm a little bit and you'll have her eating right out of your hand in no time."

"I see," Carol called, coming up and surprising all the three of the men. She was bringing a water bucket and grinning at them when they all turned. "And is that what you did, Tyreese? Turned on the charm so I would eat right out of your hand?"

Tyreese stood there quietly and it was evident that he was carefully considering how to answer that question or even if he should actually answer it. When he didn't respond, Carol offered the bucket to the three of them. They all dropped what they were doing and took a moment to get a drink.

"You always talk about women gossiping," Carol said while they were drinking, "yet every time I come out here to check on you all, that's just what you're doing. I'm surprised you're getting any work done."

"We gettin' plenty of work done," Daryl protested. "We gonna have this barn ready long 'fore we have to."

"Maybe so," Carol said. "What amazes me is that you've all got the balls to talk about Sadie when she's just inside."

"Can't hear us," Daryl said.

"Still, she might catch you," Carol said. She turned her attention to Rick. "Sadie's not going to just eat out of your hand, Rick. She doesn't need you. Sorry if that hurts your ego, but it's true. She's not going to come to you either."

Rick gulped another cup of water and smiled at Carol.

"Any suggestions then?" He asked. If Carol was willing to give advice, he was willing to listen to it.

"She's not going to ask you to the party. She has no intention of asking anyone. I know it's lady's choice, but why don't you ask her about it? Offer to escort her, not as a date, but as a friend. The worst that happens is she tells you no, but she may be waiting to find out that you're sure about what you're feeling," Carol said. She turned her eyes at Tyreese for a moment and then went back to talking to Rick. "Just make sure you want what you're asking for, Rick, before you do it. Beau knows he wants her, and I think his intentions are pretty noble. If you run that option off for her completely, don't be an ass about it."

Carol didn't wait for Rick to respond. As soon as Daryl had dropped his cup back into the bucket she heaved it up and stepped through the hole where they'd been building the door frame for the barn to offer Sadie, who was working inside, some water.

"And Prince Charming," Carol said, turning back toward Tyreese, "I need you to take a quick trip to the rabbit pens when you get a chance. The wiring has gotten torn loose on one side and I'm not sure how long my patching is going to hold."

"Yes ma'am," Tyreese said, grinning at her.

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Rick caught up with Sadie as they were both headed back to headquarters to get bathing water before dinner. Sadie turned when she felt him tug on her shoulder. She slowed her pace and allowed him to catch up.

"You're doing a really amazing job down at the barn," Rick said.

Sadie smiled at him. She felt disgusting. She was soaking wet with sweat and she could smell herself. She could feel sweat dripping down the back of her neck, and she knew she was disgusting because every inch of her arms was caked with dirt and dust and splinters from the work she'd been doing. The attempt to convert the house into a suitable barn like structure was taking shape, but it wasn't easy work, and it wasn't clean work by any means.

Yet for as filthy as she felt, she found it a little flattering that Rick was still attempting to flirt with her.

"Thank you," she said. "You're doing good too. You guys will have the doors on before you know it."

She smiled at him, and he returned the smile.

"Listen," Rick said, catching her by the shoulder again and forcibly pulling her to a stop in the middle of the pat that she was treading. He grabbed her shoulders and squared her in front of him so that she was facing him. "I know that you haven't asked anyone to escort you to the party, and I know that it's lady's choice, but I wanted to let you know that I'd like to go with you if you're not thinking of asking anyone else."

Sadie regarded Rick for a moment. He was sweaty and he had what had once been dirt but was now mud swiped across his face and forehead. He was looking intensely at her like he'd just asked her one of the most serious questions. She knew that men had sensitive egos, and she knew that she had to tread easy, especially with a man like Rick. She wasn't sure that he'd entirely moved on from his wife, but for whatever reason he seemed to think that she would be good for him.

Sadie smiled.

"I don't think you know what you want yet," Sadie said. "I don't think you really want to be with me, Rick, I think you just don't want to be alone."

A look of confusion or disappointment one crossed Rick's face. Sadie wasn't positive which. He could be difficult to read at times.

"Sadie, are you trying to tell me what I want, or are you trying to tell me what you don't want?" Rick asked finally. "Because if it's about you, then don't put that on me. We've all got enough feelings to sort out these days without carrying around ones that have been put on us."

Sadie smiled.

"Fine," she said. "You can take me to the party, but we'll go as friends. You know where I live. You might not recognize me without all this crap on my face. I'll be the clean one in purple."

Rick was still looking at her for a moment, his hands holding firm to each of her shoulders, but then his expression softened and finally turned into a smile. He nodded his head and chuckled a little.

"OK then," he said.

"OK?" Sadie asked.

He nodded again, smiling.

"OK, it's a date then," he said.

"As friends," Sadie corrected, pointing her finger at him and lowering her eyebrows. He smiled.

"As friends. It's a date as friends," Rick corrected.

He continued to stand there a moment, holding her shoulders and smiling. Sadie smiled back at him.

"Can I go get a bath now?" She asked finally.

Rick let go of her shoulders.

"Of course," he said. He didn't say anything else to her, but he did keep in step with her until they got to headquarters where Mark was busy handing out buckets of heated water to anyone who wanted them. Sadie accepted her bucket and waited a moment while Rick took his. She allowed him to walk her to her house and bid him goodbye until dinner time. She slipped inside, grateful that she could finally wash off the crud that was caked on her skin, smiling to herself at how surprised Rick had looked that she agreed to have dinner with him at the soiree.

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"What's your dress look like, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked.

Michonne sat on the edge of the bed and finished rubbing lotion on the parts of her body that she could reach. She tossed the bottle backward at Daryl and smiled because moments later she felt his hands coating her back. She never had to ask him anymore. She just offered him the bottle and he gladly rubbed her back for her.

"It's pretty," she said. "I don't want to ruin it for you. It's not as nice as some of the others. We just sort of had to make due. Not too many of the women around here had formal maternity clothes. Carol's dress looks really nice, and Sadie's isn't bad. Beth's is one of the prettiest, I think."

"I bet'cha every bit as pretty as anybody else, 'Chonne. I bet'cha the prettiest one there," Daryl said.

Michonne smiled to herself.

"You're only saying that because you're trying to take advantage of me," she responded. Daryl massaged her neck and she let her head hang forward, enjoying the feeling of him squeezing at her muscles.

"I ain't tryin' to take advantage of ya," he said. "I really do think you gon' be the prettiest woman there."

"And what about you, Daryl? What can I expect to see you wearing?" Michonne asked.

"You'll see me, 'Chonne," Daryl said. "Ain't much to look at, though. I don't much like the outfit, but Mark said you was gonna like it."

"I'm sure I will, Daryl," Michonne responded. "To be honest, I'm a little excited to see you all cleaned up."

"Tell me I ain't gotta wear a tie though, 'Chonne, 'cause that ain't even fair. That thing feels like a noose an' Mark said I gotta wear it 'less ya said I didn't have to," Daryl said.

Michonne smiled. She _was_ excited to see Daryl dressed up with a new haircut and his beard trimmed. She'd asked Mark not to shave it completely. She liked his beard, it just needed to be trimmed a little. She knew, though that asking Daryl to wear a tie might be a bit much. She wanted him fixed up, but she didn't want him uncomfortable the whole evening. That could take the fun out of it.

"OK, Daryl, I'll tell Mark that you don't have to wear a tie if you'll tell Maggie that you're fine with me not wearing any kind of heels," Michonne said. She'd argued a little with Maggie when the girl had insisted she wear a pair of low heels and she'd insisted that she had a pair of flats she'd much rather spend the evening in.

"Shoot, 'Chonne, I don't care if ya don't wear no shoes at all. I ain't gon' be lookin' at your feet," Daryl said.

"Well you just remember to tell Maggie that over breakfast and I'll make sure that Mark knows that I like my man with a few buttons undone," Michonne said.

Daryl stopped rubbing her back and she turned toward him, his lips seeking hers out immediately. She kissed him lazily, their tongues battling for ground for a moment. When they pulled apart, she smiled at him. He nuzzled her ear.

"I found a pretty dress for Hope too," Michonne said. "You're going to have to escort both of us."

"Only thing better than bein' there with the prettiest woman is bein' there with _both_ the prettiest," Daryl said.

"And we're lucky enough to get to go with the most handsome man," Michonne said.

Daryl pushed her back on the bed and kissed her again, straddling her and turning his attention to running his hands gently over her body. He kissed her neck, sucking gently at the skin there as his hands went to her breasts.

"I also found you a pair of earrings," Michonne said. Daryl stopped kissing her a minute and smiled at her. She couldn't help but smile back. "They're not quite as flashy as the ones that you found, but they do sparkle," she said. Daryl grinned again and kissed her. "You're not hating the idea of this as much as you were before, now are you?" She asked.

"No, 'Chonne, I don't reckon I is," he said. "I am worried, though, 'bout what we gon' do when we get home from this here party."

"Are you?" She asked. Daryl went back to kissing her neck, one hand sliding down her body to tease her. She bucked underneath him.

"Yeah," he whispered in her ear. "I was thinkin' we might oughta practice, ya know, so we can get it right then."

"Practice, huh?" She asked, panting from his teasing. "Like this?" She asked, swallowing.

"Yeah, a lil' bit like this," he said. "Maybe a lil' bit more, too."

He lowered his mouth to her breast, his hand not letting up on its efforts to drive her over the edge. She closed her eyes, reaching to tangle her hand in his hair.

"Would ya like that?" He asked, raising his head from sucking at her nipple. "Ya wanna practice just a lil' bit more?"

"Mmmm hmmm," Michonne forced out. Daryl chuckled and increased his speed on her core, holding himself up over her.

"Then come on and get on about it, 'Chonne. Then I'll join ya for a 'round," he said.

Michonne let herself go, her mind spinning at the orgasm that rolled over her. As she started to come back to herself, Daryl was already changing positions, this time dropping down to lap at her and tease her with his tongue. She rolled her head back on the pillow, realizing that it was going to be a long night before they finally got any sleep, but also realizing that she didn't care in the slightest right now if they slept at all.


	97. Chapter 97

Finally the day of the soiree had come and it had practically been declared some kind of national holiday within the community. The men gathered at Rick's house where Mark worked systematically handling haircuts for some while others took their time shaving. Daryl felt like he'd never fussed so much over his appearance in his life and it left him wondering what the women were doing at Maggie and Glenn's house.

"Ain't never pruned so damn much in my life," Daryl growled, buttoning his shirt and watching while Tyreese tied Glenn's tie for him.

"It's gonna be worth it, man," Tyreese said with a chuckle. "Just think, however pretty we're getting the women are getting three times as pretty. Just stay focused on the prize."

"Ya sure are excited," Daryl said.

"That I am," Tyreese said. "Carol already told me that she thinks her dress is inappropriate, which tells me that it's going to be great."

"'Chonne wouldn't tell me nothin' but hers is nice," Daryl said, "an she ain't gotta wear no high shoes 'cause I ain't gotta wear no noose like you."

Beau came over, standing behind Glenn, his tie in his hands.

"Need help, boy?" Daryl asked. He held his hand out toward Beau.

"Ya can't tie no tie," Beau said. "Ya ain't even got one on."

"Come 'ere an' shut ya mouth, Beau," Daryl said. "I didn't say I can't tie no tie, I said I don't like wearin' the damn things. There's a world a difference."

Beau huffed and reluctantly gave the tie over to Daryl, noticing that Tyreese was circling around helping anyone else that may have difficulty with their own ties.

Daryl tied the tie for Beau and Beau tugged at it with his finger.

"Feels like I can't breathe," Beau protested. Daryl grinned at him in response.

"Now ya understand why the hell I ain't gotta wear one," Daryl said. "What'cha gettin' all gussied up for anyway, boy? I thought you weren't goin' with no one."

Beau continued to tug at the tie until Daryl finally reached up and loosed the knot a little. Beau made a show of choking and swallowing before he finally proclaimed the tie "better."

"I ain't goin' with no one, but that don't mean I don't aim ta turn a head or two," Beau said.

Daryl shook his head and clapped Beau on the shoulder.

"Beau, ain't'cha seen Rick in there gettin' all cleaned up? Now I know you think that you gon' have a chance if ya go showin' off your tail feathers to Sadie, but that's a hen that's good as set. I don't wanta see ya gettin' your feelin's hurt if she don't respond to you like your hopin'," Daryl said.

"Ya don't nothin' no way," Beau protested. "I ain't even said it was Sadie I was tryin' ta get the eye of no way, could be 'Chonne I'm after."

Beau grumbled then and walked off, and Daryl chuckled.

"He's got it bad," Tyreese said, coming up behind Daryl. Daryl chuckled again.

"Oh yeah, he's got it alright," Daryl responded.

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Mark was the first to leave the house. He and Stella had been running back and forth for a while making sure that dinner was going fine. When it was finally time for everyone to leave, though, the men were to leave Rick's house and go and pick up the women, each of which would be waiting at their residence.

"Let's get a move on," Seth called, starting the procession out of the house. Daryl thought it was odd that suddenly he felt nervous. He was thankful that he didn't have a tie on because it was hard enough to breathe without it and he was sure that if he was wearing one he'd nearly be dead by now.

They all came out of the house in a wave. Seth parted first, crossing the street to go and pick up Rachel who was waiting for him. Beau headed for his own house to check on his housemates. Though they had not participated in the festivities thus far, Maggie had made sure that they had clothes in case they should decide to join them, and regardless of their dress they would have to come and eat dinner because only the one meal was available for the evening. The rest of them continued down the street, each parting as they reached the house where the woman they were escorting was waiting for them on the porch. Daryl almost laughed at himself, the closer he got to his house the more nervous he grew, until he almost felt as terrified as he had back when he'd only been imagining how Michonne might react to him expressing any interest in her. What made it worse was that he was walking beside Tyreese, who seemed to be more excited than anything else, not a hint of nerves on his face.

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Beau called through the window announcing his presence to the reclusive people who lived with him. To his surprise, he was greeted when Emma passed him Sam and Jacob through the window. Beau took each of the boys, one at a time. He put Jacob down, but hoisted Sam up onto his hip. A moment later Emma scurried through the window. Beau stood there, examining the three of them. The boys were both wearing suits. Sam's fit, but Jacob's pants were dramatically too short. Emma was wearing a lavender dress. Her wildly short cropped hair coupled with the ruffles of the dress made her look like some kind of fairy to Beau, but he refrained from saying so.

"So your goin' ta dinner all dolled up, huh?" He asked when she stood and smoothed down her frills.

"Libby said we could," Emma replied, smiling. Beau returned the smile.

"Well ya look real pretty, an' I bet if ya hurry ya can catch Carl. He ain't got no one ta go with him an' ya just about his size. I'll take the boys," Beau said. Emma smiled at him and shot off the porch like a bullet. "Ya comin' Libby? Ya ain't gon' wanta get leftovers if'n it tastes as good as Mark said it do," Beau called back through the window.

Libby appeared a few minutes later and slid through the window, coming to stand in front of Beau on the porch. She'd also opted to wear the dress that Maggie had brought her. It was an ill-fitting green dress. Beau couldn't hide his smile at her.

"What'cha laughin' at?" Libby asked, scrunching her face up.

"Ya look like one a' them little Irish fellas," Beau said. Libby swatted him and yanked Sam from his arms. Beau chuckled.

"Come on, we best get on down there, I wanna see what everyone else looks like," Beau said. He took Jacob's hand and started off the porch with Libby and Sam close behind him.

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As Rick approached Sadie's house she stepped off the porch to meet him. He smiled at her and she returned the gesture.

"Don't you look like a picture?" He said, offering Sadie his arm. She wrapped hers around his.

"Very handsome," she said with a smile.

"Why thank you," Rick said. "Shall we go to dinner?"

Sadie didn't respond, but she did smile and nod. Rick put his right hand over her arm that was looped through his left arm and started in the direction of headquarters with the flood of others.

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"Beth's dress is my favorite so far," Carol said to Michonne, both of them leaning just over the side of the porch to watch everyone else coming. Daryl and Tyreese were taking their time getting there.

"Hers is pretty," Michonne said. "Look at Sadie's though, I didn't think it would look as good as it does, but with her hair done it looks a lot better."

Glenn and Maggie came by their porch then, both almost running. Both of them grinning ear to ear.

"Sexy ladies!" Glenn called, whooping as they went past laughing.

"Would you look at Beau?" Carol said. "He looks like such a man!"

Michonne couldn't help but smile at the boy. He was walking along with Libby who had her youngest cousin hiked up on her hip. Beau was holding the hand of the older boy who stopped from time to time to kick at what one could only presume were loose rocks in the street.

"That he does, but then again, I don't think our Beau is as young as we give him credit for, and judging by that dress, neither is Libby," Michonne said. The girl's dress was ill fitting due to the fact that she hadn't been sized for it with the same careful considerations that Beth had given everyone else's dresses, but she filled it out, there was no doubt about it.

"I'm just happy to see she's not starting a fight with anyone," Carol said. Libby and her gang had yet to fully assimilate to life in the community, but Beau seemed to get along pretty well with them, and therefore everyone left the five of them to their own devices.

Finally Daryl and Tyreese, who had been moving at a snail's pace reached the porch.

"Hello there, ladies," Tyreese said, stepping up to the bottom of the steps.

"Da Da! Hold me!" Judith called, reaching out her arms to Tyreese. Carol and Michonne had found both the girls what had probably been Easter dresses. Judith's was pink and Hope's was yellow. They'd put both the girls' hair up in pigtails. Neither of the girls, however, had seemed to be concerned with a single thing beyond their fascination with the fact that their skirts swirled when they turned, a novelty which had caused both of them to fall at least a half a dozen times since they'd been placed in the dresses.

Tyreese reached out his arms and Judith all bet fell into them.

"Well aren't you pretty, Jude?" Tyreese said. Judith grinned at him.

"My dress is pink," she said. "Hope is lah-llow." Judith pointed at Hope.

"That's right, now let me get a good look at your beautiful Mama here, and let your Uncle Daryl get around here," Tyreese said. He took Carol's hand and she dismounted the porch to join him. They started toward headquarters, leaving Daryl standing at the bottom of the steps, looking up at Michonne with Hope on her hip. Hope was enthralled by Michonne's earrings.

"She likes ya earrings," Daryl said, smiling. He couldn't believe how nervous he was. He felt like he'd never even had a conversation with Michonne before.

"She's like her Daddy," Michonne said. "She likes anything that's shiny." Michonne stood there for a moment smiling at Daryl. "You look very handsome, Daryl. I like your haircut."

"Thanks," Daryl mumbled. He felt like he was being suffocated by his tie, but then he remembered that he wasn't wearing one.

Michonne smiled again and started down the steps. Daryl reached a hand up to help her. When she was standing on the ground in front of him she passed him Hope who smiled at him and accepted a kiss on the cheek, returning it for Daryl.

"Aren't you going to say anything to me, Daryl? You're going to make me feel self-conscious," Michonne said after a moment.

"Ya look real pretty, 'Chonne," Daryl said. "I reckon I was right."

"Right about what?" Michonne asked.

"I said you was gonna be the prettiest one out here, an' I reckon I was right," Daryl responded.

Michonne leaned in and kissed Daryl.

"And I'm lucky enough to be going to dinner with the most handsome man out here," she said. Daryl blushed, but smiled at her.

"I like your dress," Daryl said.

Michonne looked at it. It was a fairly plain dress composed of several pastel colors. It was the kind of thing that she might have worn before to a nice dinner, that much was true, and she'd found a nice flower clip to pull her dreads up with, but she wasn't nearly as well dressed as some of the women who looked more like they were going to prom or to a black tie affair.

"It's simple, Daryl," Michonne said.

"So am I," Daryl said.

Michonne grinned at him and kissed him again, this time holding it for longer than the kiss before.

"Ya can't be doin' that before dinner, 'Chonne or we ain't gonna enjoy none of the party 'cause I'm gon' be too focused on gettin' ya back home," Daryl said.

Michonne smiled and offered Daryl her arm on the side where he wasn't carrying Hope.

"Then shall we get going?" Michonne asked.

"You know what, 'Chonne?" Daryl said, just before they started walking.

"What, Daryl?" Michonne asked. He looped his arm in hers and started in the direction that most everyone had already travelled.

"I wish we still had us cameras, 'cause I sure reckon tonight would be a nice picture to put in my book," he said.

Michonne sighed a little.

"I guess that's why we have memories, Daryl," she said. "Come on, let's go eat and get a good look at everyone else!"

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After dinner everyone gathered in the street area outside of headquarters. Mark and Stella had kept the fire burning from dinner and built it up just a little to keep the area lit for when dark started to fall around them. Everyone had enjoyed dinner, and it was a novelty to see everyone looking clean and well put together these days when it had been ages since any of them had thought of exercising any kind of vanity such as the perfumes and other personal touches that had been put together for the evening. It was an evening of whimsy, no doubt, but it was something special that all of them enjoyed in their own way.

After dinner, Mark surprised the group by producing a guitar that Glenn had found for him. He professed that he would play, and if she knew the songs, his beautiful companion Stella would sing for them.

"You can play the guitar?" Carol scoffed at Mark when he produced it, inviting everyone to turn the street directly into headquarters into a bonfire lit dance floor.

"Of course I can play the guitar. Like me, however, it may be a little out of tune," Mark said, fiddling with the strings. "OK, everyone, I'll take requests, but my knowledge is pretty limited. I might not know anything that the youngsters know, but I think I can take a few of us back to our high school days for a bit."

And so Mark played the guitar, and even when Stella didn't know the words, she hummed and tried to accompany him, both of them simply enjoying the task of trying to entertain the others. Everyone danced, whether alone or accompanied. It was such a novelty that no one wanted to miss the opportunity whether they felt confident in their skills or not. Daryl was one of the few that hesitated at first, but Michonne wasn't going to let him get away with sitting out the only dance they were likely to attend.

"Come on, Daryl," she protested, "dance with me."

"Can't dance," Daryl replied. He looked around at everyone else, and the more he watched them, the more nervous he grew. Some of them were pulled close to one another, swaying back and forth, others had more elaborate steps to their swaying.

"And Mark can't play," Michonne responded, "but it doesn't matter. What matters is that we're dancing together. No one else cares what we look like."

Daryl protested once or twice more.

"Daryl," Michonne said, obviously beginning to lose her cool, "I want to dance, and if you don't dance with me I'm going to start to believe that you're ashamed of me," she whispered in a gruff tone. Daryl glanced around again.

"It ain't you, 'Chonne. I ain't never danced and I ain't no good at it!" Daryl protested.

"Daryl," Michonne argued, "_Sadie_ is dancing with Rick and she can't even hear the music. I don't care how bad or how good you are, just follow my lead and you'll be fine."

Finally Daryl had given in. He was stiff at first, afraid that everyone would be watching him and judging him for his inability to sway gracefully around the asphalt dance floor that was provided to them, but eventually he loosened up when he realized that really and truly no one was paying him any attention.

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As the evening drew on, one by one people started saying their goodbyes. Each couple left walking a little closer than they had come to dinner. Michonne kept casting glances over to the side where Beau was dancing with the girls, Hope having obviously gone to sleep on his shoulder, but Judith still twirling about, though with a little less enthusiasm than she had earlier. Michonne snuggled into Daryl, his arms wrapped around her. They weren't so much dancing any longer as they were merely swaying in place, much like the other couples that were left.

Finally, when she'd had about all her feet could stand, Michonne pulled away from Daryl slightly.

"Somethin' wrong, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked, not wanting to admit that he hated for the dancing to end once it had begun.

"I think I'm ready to go home, Mr. Dixon," Michonne said, leaning up on her toes a little to kiss him. Daryl smiled at her.

"OK, Mrs. Dixon, I reckon we can go if you're ready," he said. "I wanta get home 'fore Tyreese an' Carol call it a night anyway."

Michonne smiled at him and watched as he went to collect Hope from Beau.

"Get Judith too," Michonne said. "We'll put her down for Carol."

As Daryl walked back to meet her with Hope against his shoulder and Judith holding to his finger, Michonne waved at Carol, signaling that they had the child. Carol waved back, quickly replacing her arm around Tyreese.

Michonne and Daryl headed to their house, anxious to call it a night and spend a little alone time together.

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Rick walked Sadie home. They were one of the final couples to leave. Mark and Stella stayed behind with Beau and a couple of the others to make sure the fire was out and everything was set for bed.

When they reached the porch, Rick walked up to the door with Sadie.

"Well goodnight," Rick said. "It was nice."

"Thank you," Sadie said. "It was nice, I had fun."

Rick stood there a moment awkwardly as if he didn't know if he should try to kiss her goodnight or not. Finally he made the move to do so and Sadie turned her cheek to him. Rick smiled at her after he'd kissed her cheek.

"You won't give an inch, will you?" He asked. Sadie smiled again and made a face at him as though she were deep in thought, pretending to scratch her chin.

"I think I gave an inch or two," she said finally.

"How do you figure?" Rick asked. "You won't even let me kiss you goodnight!" Sadie smiled again in response.

"But I didn't say anything to you when we were dancing and you didn't keep your hands where a gentleman should," she said, raising her eyebrows.

Rick grinned and shrugged.

"Natural hand placement?" He said. Sadie cocked an eyebrow at him and then smiled.

"I'm too short for that," she said. "Goodnight, Rick."

"Goodnight, Sadie," Rick said. He turned and dismounted the steps, stopping at the bottom to watch her disappear through the door.

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"Maggie and Mark did a great job," Michonne said to Daryl when they finally had the girls down and retired to their room. Neither of them had made a move to undress yet, each taking just another moment to admire the other.

"It was a right nice party," Daryl said.

Michonne smiled and walked over to him, fumbling a little with the collar of the button down blue shirt that he was wearing under his jacket.

"I think you like to dance more than you let on, Mr. Dixon," Michonne said, teasingly. Daryl grinned.

"I reckon it weren't as bad as I thought it would be," Daryl responded. "Helps that I had me a pretty woman to be dancing with."

Michonne put her head against Daryl's chest and he wrapped his arms around her again, swaying a moment as they had outside.

"It was a good night, Daryl," Michonne said.

"It was, you're right," Daryl said. "We could do it again, ya know? Everyone seemed to like it a whole lot."

"You mean you'd _want_ to do it again? After all the fuss you made about it?" Michonne asked, incredulous.

Daryl chuckled.

"If'n I get to see you all prettied up like you was tonight, I'd do it again, 'Chonne," Daryl responded. "Now come on, let's get outta these clothes. I got some other moves I'd like to show ya."

Michonne laughed.

"More dance moves?" She asked, raising her eyebrow. Daryl moved around behind her and unzipped her dress.

"Somethin' like that," Daryl said, "we just gon' be doin' a different kinda dancin'."


	98. Chapter 98

Since the night of the soiree everyone had been talking about it. Michonne felt like they'd all described the night so many times to each other that it was almost mythical. There had been something magical about it, though, and they no longer lived in a world where you let yourself often believe in magic and fairy tales. There wasn't Disney around any longer to sell that, or movies that convinced you that you could be swept off your feet during some enchanted evening. In reality, all they still had was a night when everyone had dressed up wearing the clothes of dead people and danced in the street of an old gated community, a fire burning near them, while an out of tune duo sung songs with made up lyrics to the tune of a guitar that was missing a string.

Still, the night had _seemed_ magical, and that was all that was really important. It had raised morale to a remarkable level too, and Michonne noticed that even she was more enthusiastic about doing the work that needed to be done.

Their indoor bunny house was finally complete. It had been a simple project. It required merely that they empty the house in question, next to the one that they were converting into a barn of sorts, bunny proof it to the degree that their energetic furry friends couldn't cause themselves harm, section off parts of it for breeding bunnies, mothers with kits, and otherwise growing bunnies, and provide beds, water, and feeding areas for everyone. All that was left now was the work that they were employed in this particular day, which was transferring all the animals from one location to another. That job wasn't hard, but it was time consuming. They couldn't simply put ten to fifteen live rabbits in a bag and throw it over their shoulders for each trip. The rabbits were food and not pets, that much was clear given that they were identified mostly by markings, size, and gender, but they as the food giving, and therefore life giving, beings that they were, no one wished to mistreat them in any way.

Michonne reasoned, along with the others that had taken special interests in the rabbits, that if they kept their little treasures well taken care of they were likely to continue breeding indoors even through the winter months. That would keep the smokehouses filled, and that kept the table from ever lacking meat.

The barn was a different story altogether. It was coming along, that much was true, but not with the speed that their idealistic plans had made them hope for. It wasn't for lack of planning, and it wasn't for lack of effort, it was simply owing to the fact that there weren't enough workers to transform the house into the barn of Tyreese's vision as quickly as if they'd had a large, well-trained construction crew. What was true, though, was that it was at least ready to be temporarily a home for the goats and pigs that they had. The part that they had prepared was sectioned off into pens and the animals had somewhere to go. They could at least survive there, and everyone reasoned that they could continue working through the winter. The animals could be taken outside on intervals during the day while people continued to work to bring the project together. Tyreese had done a masterful job at building the doors, and Sadie was a demon at tearing down everything inside that he told her to get rid of. The barn was going to come together, it just wasn't going to be overnight.

With the cold weather setting in, Carol had abandoned a good number of her old jobs into the hands of Maggie and Beth who organized, from time to time, teams of the other individuals in the community. Carol didn't have time for cooking regular meals or doing laundry because she'd turned her attention full steam ahead to making sure that they had everything put away that they possibly could for the winter. She was mastering soap with the fat they collected from butchering anything they got their hands on. She was also making sure that every single they brought in from the fields, which were almost spent, was put away. She refused to let even one morsel of their harvest rot, knowing full well that one jar of food could be a big deal if times were lean enough.

They had discovered in the last few weeks, as well, that Libby had the uncanny ability to butcher and clean rabbits as though they had zippers. During their preparation for the bunny house, Carol had culled their rabbit herd, as they called it, and designated the ones that would go to the smokehouses instead of being transferred to the new winter residence. Libby had made it her life's occupation to butcher and clean the culled rabbits and string them up where there was space inside the three smokehouses that Tyreese had provided them with.

Michonne, carrying a few of the bunnies toward their new home, was feeling very optimistic about life in general. She couldn't help it, and she wasn't entirely sure it didn't have something to do with her hormones. The baby was growing, and though her body felt more cumbersome than it had in the recent past, she knew that winter also held the promise of their new arrival, and of her finally feeling completely in control of herself again. She didn't hate being pregnant, not as much as she told Daryl she did when she was feeling especially smothered by him, but she was really ready not to feel like the host to an alien life form any longer. This baby was much more active than Hope had been and it seemed to like to do most of it somersaults and gymnastics when she thought it was a better time for sleeping. She also hated feeling limited like she did. She worked daily, alongside the others, but she knew that they were accomplishing much more than she was at speeds she just didn't seem to be able to reach anymore.

Still, it looked like they would soon be ready to face the cold that was coming, and the coolness that had already come kept her from being as miserable as the heat would have made her, so she was thankful for that. She had already told Daryl, though, that beyond a shadow of a doubt this was her last child. There simply was no negotiating to be done. She'd hang in there through the birth of this one, but she was done with child bearing after this. She could understand now, from the conversations she'd had with Sadie while they worked, why the woman had insisted that her tubes be tied after her fifth child. There a came a very distinct moment when you knew you wanted to throw in the towel, and Michonne knew she was at that point. Luckily, Daryl hadn't even seemed disappointed. He'd fully agreed that they were done and their focus after the birth would be making sure that Hope and her future sibling had the best life that they could provide for them, given the circumstances.

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"Libby," Daryl called as he approached the girl that was inside one of the smokehouses. "Libby, can ya come out here for a minute?"

Libby stepped halfway through the door of the smokehouse, ash smeared across her face. She'd been tending the fires apparently, though he'd suspected she might be hanging more of the rabbits designated for butchering.

"What is it?" She called back.

With all the talk of winter preparations they'd seen a change in Libby. She couldn't exactly be said to be the most social individual in their community, but she was a hard worker. Apparently having goals spoke to the girl and it seemed that giving her the job of putting away meat for the winter had been one of the best moves that they could make. She seemed to like being useful. She'd pushed Emma in the direction of helping with whatever they could put her to doing, and the younger boys had been released from their captivity inside the house she shared with Beau to frolic with the girls and wreak havoc on the nerves of whoever was the unlucky soul who drew babysitting duty for the day. There was one characteristic about Libby that hadn't changed, though, she was somewhat skittish of people.

Libby seemed to have formed an attachment to Beau, which probably was brought about by the fact they shared a house, and also by the fact that Beau was the kind of person that it was difficult to be afraid of. He was too laid back to seem like a threat, and truly he wasn't much of one unless he felt you were threatening him or someone that he was dedicated to protection. The girl had also formed an odd sort of bond with Sadie, as though their brawl had brought her some kind of respect for the woman. Sadie seemed rather fond of Libby, as well, having fully forgiven her for her attack. Libby didn't demand much conversation from Sadie, and Daryl assumed that Sadie appreciated it. They'd developed a manner of communicating with each other that was almost silent and simply happened with gestures and facial expressions.

Daryl knew, though, that for whatever reason Libby was skittish around him especially. She seemed to respect him, but she didn't like to be singled out by him for any reason, even if it was just to show his appreciation and admiration at a job well done.

"I just need ta talk to ya," Daryl said.

"Ain't done yet, gimme a second," Libby called back, disappearing again inside the smokehouse without waiting for Daryl's response. He stood in the street, his arms crossed across his chest, and watched the bustling back and forth of the others who were scurrying around headquarters doing the variety of jobs that each had been assigned for the day. Finally the girl reappeared and stepped out, closing the smokehouse doors. She walked toward Daryl, pushing her curls out of her face. They were beginning to grow back now, and she'd also begun to put on some weight. She no longer looked quite like the girl he thought she was once, and Daryl was beginning to suspect that she, like Beau, were not quite as young as everyone had decided they were in the beginning. "What'cha want? I was doin' what I was s'posed ta be doin'," she said, already establishing a somewhat defensive tone.

"I know ya was doin' what ya was supposed ta be doin'," Daryl said. "I ain't said ya was doin' nothin' wrong, Libby, I just need ta talk to ya."

Daryl had been up most of the night because of Michonne. She tried to let him sleep, but she did a lot of tossing and turning at night and it was difficult to sleep in a bed when your partner couldn't keep still for more than ten minutes at the time. He didn't complain, though, and he often pretended he was sleeping when he wasn't so that she wouldn't feel bad about keeping him awake. The time that he spent awake, though, gave him a lot of time to think about all the last minute things that they needed to try to do in order to really cement the possibility of a successful and uneventful winter.

"Fine, so talk," Libby said, her hands going to her hips.

"Let's you an' me take a walk," Daryl said. Libby looked at him at first like she was unsure of such a proposition, but finally she agreed. Daryl walked with her a moment and got farther away from everyone else before he finally began to speak to her. "What's ya story, Libby? You been here a while, but ya still ain't told a soul how ya ended up at that farm house with all them young'uns."

Libby was quiet for a moment but she continued walking. Daryl sensed a hesitance on her part.

"Libby, we all got our stories," Daryl said. "We all lost a lotta things on the way here, an' ain't nobody gonna judge ya 'cause a' yours. I just wanta get a little better feel for ya an' what ya been through out there. It couldn't a' been an easy task endin' up like you was."

"Ain't nothin' ta tell," Libby said. "Like ya done said, we all lost a lot, I ain't no different. I ended up with them young'uns 'cause they's all I got left. That oughtta answer all ya damn questions right there."

Daryl realized that he might have struck a nerve. People were strange about their stories. Some of them shared them freely, like Sadie, giving you every gory detail you might try to drag out of them. Others offered bits and pieces when necessary, like Michonne. Even others, like Carol, wore their stories like a badge of honor to show just how far they _had_ come and to serve as symbol of how far they hoped to go. And finally there were those like Libby that seemed to want to keep their stories to themselves, locked away, either as some kind of treasure that they didn't want to share with anyone else, or like some kind of nightmare that they were afraid of letting others see.

"Fair enough," Daryl said after a moment. "Just tell me this, Libby, how did ya keep 'em safe? When ya was alone, how'd ya keep them young'uns from gettin' hurt. It ain't easy out there ta keep yourself goin', but somehow you managed ta keep all a' them goin' too."

"I hid 'em," Libby said. She stopped walking near the fence line and Daryl stopped walking too. "I hid 'em just like ya seen. We never stayed in no spot more'n a couple days. If'n ya didn't stay put it was harder fer the dead'uns ta catch up with ya. If we'd known that before, I mighta not been the only one draggin' them young'uns around."

Daryl considered the girl a moment and she stared back at him, almost like she was trying to look into his mind.

"So ya kept 'em hid, but that couldn't be all, Libby. I been out there, an' I know what it takes ta keep people alive. They couldn't help ya fight or look for food," Daryl said. Libby shifted.

"I left 'em where they was hid an' I went out in tha mornin's. I found 'em a new spot, never too far from where we was, just whenever I could find somethin' that looked like it might have somethin' ta eat somewhere. I cleaned out the dead'uns that was there an' then I moved 'em to tha new place. We ate what we could an' then I moved 'em again. It weren't no kinda special plan ner nothin'. I just kept goin'," Libby responded. Her voice sounded almost desperate. Like she was trying to explain the simplest thing to Daryl that she could possibly think to explain, but he just wasn't capable of understanding how very simple it was. "They's all I got left, an' I figured if I could keep 'em from gettin' hurt then I wasn't gonna be alone, an' havin' 'em there made me not so sad 'bout everyone else that was already gone."

Daryl nodded. He could understand that feeling. He hadn't been alone out there. He'd always been with someone else, but he knew the feeling of not wanting to lose the people you did have for fear of ending up entirely alone, like Beau had.

"Listen, Libby, when ya was at that farm house and ya had all them pigs an' goats, was they the first animals ya came across?" Daryl asked.

Libby shook her head.

"Nah, we had done eat some a' the chickens that was left there an' I seen other animals, but I weren't able ta get most a' the stuff we came across 'cause we had ta move 'fore the dead'uns found us," she said. "Why?"

"Do ya reckon if ya was to go an' look at some of the places where ya seen these animals ya might find more? Like were there cows or chickens? Or were there even more pigs an' shit?" Daryl asked.

Libby thought about it. Finally she nodded her head, running her fingers through her hair again to hold back the two curls that seem to insist on falling into her eyes.

"Yeah, I mean I reckon I could find some stuff. An' I know they was some cows I seen in an old barn we stayed at. I didn't mess with them 'cause we weren't gonna eat a whole cow 'fore we had to step out," she said.

"Would ya be willin' ta take the day an' go an' try to round up as many animals as ya could? Maybe a couple of days?" Daryl asked. "Whatever we could get, whatever we could bring back here for the winter could do a lot for us, especially if we was to get us some to breed."

Libby looked unsure about Daryl's proposition. She thought about it, looking conflicted.

"I ain't goin' out there alone," she said.

Daryl shook his head.

"Of course not, I weren't gonna suggest ya go alone. You can take who ya want. Take Beau an' Sadie with ya if it makes ya feel better, but it seems like ya know them farms better than anybody here," Daryl said.

Libby considered it a moment longer.

"I'll take Beau, but I ain't takin' Sadie. Ya gotta be close if ya wanna talk ta her an' I ain't takin' the chance that she get caught by some a' the dead'uns," Libby said. Daryl nodded his understanding.

"Take Carl with ya," Daryl said. "He's gettin' real good at doin' stuff like that an' he can imitate Beau almost like lookin' in a mirror. Get what'cha can today, but if ya see there's more ya wanna go back for then ya can go as often as ya need to."

Libby stood there a moment longer and then finally nodded.

"I'll go talk to 'em," she said. "We'll get some stuff together an' we'll head out just as soon as we can."

Daryl clapped her on the shoulder and she didn't pull away from him like she normally would when he made a move toward her.

"We all appreciate it, Libby. Y'all go when ya ready, an' be careful."

Libby nodded and trotted off. Daryl turned in the opposite direction and started back around the community in search of Glenn. He had plans to send him out with his own team to gather up whatever they could of feed and hay for the animals.

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Rachel, Stella, and Chelsea had taken over water runs for the most part. The three of them passed out of the gates just behind the truck that Glenn was driving out with Jimmy and Junior to go after whatever they could scrounge up in the way of feed to keep their animals from starving when winter was truly set in.

The three women made their way slowly down to the creek. Beyond the fence lines, where the Walkers seemed to pile up from time to time, there was very little Walker activity. Rachel carried two buckets, and therefore was unarmed, but she wasn't concerned. The two girls were armed, and so far they hadn't caught any Walker attention whatsoever.

"Do you suppose they're hibernating?" Chelsea asked.

"Daryl thinks they hibernate," Rachel said, "or at least they aren't as active in the winter. We've noticed that they slow down a lot. You've pretty much got to walk directly in front of them for them to even think you're worth their attention."

"Do you think they'll ever die out?" Stella asked. "I mean there could only be so many of them, right?"

"Who knows?" Rachel said. "You figure that everyone that didn't survive was pretty much a Walker. If you assume, just for our sake, that the Walker population was at least half of the United States, and probably more than that, there's a whole lot of Walkers out there, and we already know they seem to herd and migrate. I assume that they just keep moving around. We probably haven't seen half of what's coming from the more populate regions of the country."

"Not to mention," Chelsea added, "that everyone who was a survivor in the beginning isn't a survivor now. We don't know how many there are out there, but they're dying every day. Look at Frank and Dora. The survivors will repopulate the Walkers to a degree. If no one puts them down then they're just doomed to roam like the others."

"Geez," Stella said. "Aren't you two just balls of light and joy?"

Rachel snickered at the girl.

"Let's talk about something else, then," she offered. "Let's talk about something nice. Chelsea, is there something going on with you and Jimmy? I noticed you've been a lot friendlier since our little soiree."

"No," Chelsea said, "I mean at least not anything like _that_. I like talking to Jimmy. He lets me talk about my life and I let him talk about his. I guess we're just friends, but it's nice to have someone who doesn't interrupt you when you're talking, and he doesn't point out to me that I've already told him a story, when I know that I've retold the same thing at least six or seven times."

"I think we all do that," Rachel said. "There's something comforting about remembering your life, isn't there? At least the good parts of it. Sometimes I even tell myself the same stories over and over because they're the ones I like the best."

"Do you and Seth talk about your lives much?" Stella asked.

"Sometimes we do," Rachel responded. "Sometimes we're just quiet together. I guess it depends on what kind of mood we're both in. Seth is sweet, but I know he's lost a lot and there's still so much that he's not ready to let go of."

The three women reached the water and Stella trotted off to the side to kill a Walker that really seemed to have more interest in standing still between a few trees. Still, one less Walker was one less Walker, so there was no need to leave him standing there, even if he seemed to pose no real threat at the moment. Once buckets were filled, they started back, their pace even slower than it had been on the previous trek.

"Do you think that we're the lucky ones because we survived," Stella asked, "or do you think that those who have gone ahead are the lucky ones? I mean they don't have to worry anymore about when or how it's going to come, they're already wherever it is that they're going."

"I guess it depends on what you believe happens when you die," Rachel said. "That's a very personal thing, as well it should be. If you believe that we go on from here to a place where everything is glorious and wonderful, then at times I guess it seems that they're the lucky ones. If, however, you believe that there's just nothing after this, then perhaps we're the lucky ones. We're still alive, no matter if it's the storybook life we thought we might live once upon a time."

"It's not a bad life," Chelsea said. "At least it's not as bad as it was. When everything first went crazy there were a lot of times that I hoped that I would die. I just wanted to not see any more of it. I don't really feel that way now."

Rachel sighed.

"Unfortunately, that could all change. At some point we're going to have to leave our little community. Realistically we all know we can't stay there. We'll run out of food eventually, and then we'll have to go to where the food is," Rachel said. "The road is where it gets bad again."

"Let's not think about that, either," Stella said. "I always felt safe with Dominique around, even when I knew we weren't safe, and now that he's gone I just don't want to think about going back to living surrounded by Walkers every hour of the day."

Rachel smiled, turning her head toward the girl.

"Look at this way, when we move on, we move on together. There's strength in numbers, and if we follow Daryl's plan we're only on the road a week, two or so tops. It won't be as bad as not knowing where we're going," Rachel said.

"But we don't know where we'll be going," Chelsea argued.

"No," Rachel said. "We won't know where we'll end up, but we'll know that we're on our way there. It's not perfect by any means, but at least it gives you the hope that there's light at the end of the tunnel."

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The crew had gone to work unloading everything that Glenn and his search team had brought back. It wasn't all that they needed by any means, but his group was willing to head out at first light to continue. At least what they brought back, though, provided the promise that more was to come. Even if it was just grasping at straws, it felt good to have straws to grasp at.

Daryl was getting worried, though, because the three prodigal children had not returned from their hunt yet and it would be dusk soon. Michonne was circling the parameter and clearing the fences, the Walkers becoming a little more stirred up that bunched around the fences, but she hadn't reported seeing any sign of the three on the horizon in any direction.

Daryl knew that if they got somewhere and got into a tight spot they were likely to spend the night outside the community. For Beau and Libby a night in a barn loft somewhere wouldn't be concerning in the slightest. Beau had survived a while alone, simply sleeping in trees and eating whenever possible. Libby had managed to survive for however long she had, though she hadn't elaborated on how long she'd been moving the children from place to place, and she'd also managed to keep three almost defenseless people alive. Daryl also doubted that it would be problematic for Carl to stay a night away. The boy was growing up, and he was developing skills that Daryl had never been sure that he would possess. He could feed himself without any worry at all and he was becoming a skilled Walker killer. He took to Beau like his shadow and the boy was molding himself to be like Beau. Though Rick had expressed that he wasn't exactly fond of the fact that Carl's language skills were changing to match those of Beau's more closely, he certainly hadn't complained that Carl would choose to learn from someone who simply shrugged at having spent six months on their own outside the safety of prison or community walls.

It was clear, though, that Rick didn't want Carl to have to test his survival skills, and Daryl noticed that he seemed antsy about the fact that the boy was still missing. Daryl caught sight of him while they were finishing their work and he would stop randomly and get lost in his thoughts, pausing mid action at whatever he was doing. Sadie seemed to hover near him, never offering much more than a hand resting on his shoulder or something of the like to remind him that he wasn't alone and that others had worried about the safety of their loved ones as well.

When they heard the ringing of the dinner bell, everyone that was at work in the barn area put their tools away where they could find them first thing the next day and they started in the direction of headquarters. Daryl thought that it seemed a little early to be eating, but sometimes meals ran early or late depending on the work load of those usually responsible for preparing them.

As they neared headquarters, however, Daryl became aware that the bell wasn't being rung to signal a call to eat. Instead he saw in front of him the three that he'd sent out. If he hadn't recognized them by build and stance alone, he might not have known who they were. All three of them were caked in mud and Walker mess, but all three were grinning. A proud Carol was standing near them, admiring the fruits of their labor, and also probably considering how much water they'd need to even begin to resemble anything less than savages.

Beau held a rope that was attached to a grey mule that was loaded down with burlap sacks. Daryl had no idea the contents of the bags. The mule itself seemed content to stand there, and he imagined that the rope could have been dropped at any moment without the animal so much as changing his location at all. Libby grinned ear to ear. Behind her, and attached to similar rudimentary harness was a very scrawny looking cow, but Daryl could tell from a distance that she was a female, and given a few good meals could prove to be a dairy cow. Carl had the smallest load, but he was still pleased with his spoils. A complacent nanny goat stood beside him, also tied, and Carl scratched at her head. Behind that was a bleating kid, presumably the kid of the nanny goat. He was tied to the nanny, but at the moment he was busy protesting everything about his world.

"Looka here!" Daryl called out as they got closer, the three not moving at all. "I sent ya out thinkin' ya might bring us back a pig or two an' ya done brought us Old McDonald's farm!"

"Ain't all," Beau said. "We got us a mess a' chickens in them there bags an' we even found us a rooster!"

"He's in a bag all his own," Libby said. "He's an asshole. Damn near tore my arm in half an' he got Beau a couple good times too 'fore we got him sacked up, but he'll set just as good as any cock!"

Daryl noticed then that they had bandaged Libby's arm with some torn pieces of cloth and he could see the blood had soaked through in places.

"Carol, ya reckon ya can doctor 'em up for us?" Daryl asked, turning toward Carol who looked thrilled.

"That won't be a problem," Carol said. "I'm sure a few rooster scratches won't slow anyone down."

"We've got good news, too," Carl said. "We found a bull, but we couldn't get him. We tried, but he was a bigger asshole than the rooster."

"Carl!" Rick scolded, having approached just behind Daryl. Carl ducked his head for a moment and Daryl chuckled.

"I reckon if he can go an' bring us back all this he can at least call a spade a spade. A bull can be a right fierce asshole if he's got a mind ta be," Daryl said. Rick eyed him. "Tomorrow Tyreese an' me will go out with ya," Daryl said. "We'll get that bull."

"He ain't gon' stay in that there barn we're buildin'," Libby said. "He'll be busted all the damn walls out tha place. You'd be better ta fix him his own little private area an' make him a lean to or somethin' for shelter. I imagine he ain't been got by no dead'uns 'cause even they don't have a mind ta try an' tame him."

Daryl chuckled again. It sounded as if there bull might do better in whatever fenced in area they could make him away from everyone and everything else. Bull would keep calm when they were fenced up for the most part, so long as there wasn't anything causing them to get stirred up. A little privacy just might do him good and keep him from getting loose and wreaking havoc. He'd only be good for a little while anyway.

"We won't have ta keep him long," Daryl said. "He ain't gon' cover that heifer but once an' then he won't like the smell of her. We'll butcher him after we got us a calf ta show for his bad attitude."

"Good thing is," Libby said, "there's more where this came from. We ain't gon' have no slack winter at all, not if'n we can get us a few more animals. An' if we get us a billy this nanny here looks like she ain't too bad off ta throw us a few more kids 'fore she ain't no good for nothin' 'cept eatin'."

Daryl smiled. Libby looked transformed. Maybe the key was that the girl needed a purpose. In order to fit into the community, she needed to feel like she had a niche, and Libby certainly had a niche now.

"That's just fine," he said. "Ya can get whatever ya want. We'll pack that barn we're buildin' full for the winter an' work on us another if we gotta."

Daryl eyed the mule a moment. He knew that the animal couldn't be bred, and the truth was that an animal who had no reproductive qualities was really not good for much in the community besides food. He'd never eaten mule before, but he supposed that it was as good as anything.

"Reckon we'll have ta butcher that ole mule, he ain't gonna be good for too much," Daryl said.

Beau immediately moved and grabbed ahold of the rope harness around the animals head.

"We can't butcher Blue!" Beau said. "He's a good mule. Just look at him! He done carried all them chickens an' I ain't even had ta fight him none ta get this here harness on him. Come right to me. He's broke too, an' his feet an' teeth is good. He's 'bout as good as ya'd hope ta see in a mule an' you'll really see it when he gets him somethin' good ta eat."

Daryl was surprised by Beau's sudden protests about the mule. Usually Beau went along with anything that he suggested, especially when it had to do with putting food on the table. Daryl noticed that Michonne stepped beside him then, threading her fingers through his. He stood there a moment regarding the animal that Beau was petting now.

"Beau, he ain't gon' like it none stayin' here. We ain't got no pasture for him ta graze in and he ain't gon' be like that dairy cow. She's prob'ly spent most her life shut up somewhere just waitin' ta be covered or milked. That ole mule ain't lived like that," Daryl said. "He can't even make no babies nor nothin'. He'd just be eatin' an' not givin' nothin' back."

"I can take Blue out," Beau argued. "I can take him out ridin'. He's broke an' he don't even need no saddle. I could cover a lotta ground with him an' I could carry back things that I got while he was eatin' grass an' stuff. We'd be able to scavenge them farm houses an' stuff an' he'd be gettin' all the exercise he needed, prob'ly wouldn't even be eatin' a whole mess a' food 'round here."

Daryl furrowed his brow. He felt Michonne tug at his arm.

"Can I talk to you?" She asked. "Alone?"

Daryl nodded at her and walked off to the side with her.

"Let him keep the mule," Michonne said.

"But 'Chonne, that mule ain't good for nothin' really, and it's just gonna end up gettin' eat by some nasty ole Walker if he trots it around outside the community much," Daryl argued.

"So what, Daryl? So the mule gets eaten by a Walker. At least that would make sense to Beau, but us butchering it doesn't make sense to him. Now I don't know why he wants that stupid mule, but he seems to want it badly, almost as badly as he wanted Sadie. You can't give him Sadie, so at least let him have his stupid mule. If he takes it out on some runs and he gets some supplies that benefits all of us," Michonne said.

"But 'Chonne, the damn thing's just gon' end up gettin' torn up," Daryl said. He wasn't wholly convinced by Michonne's argument, but she batted her eyelashes at him and he could tell that she was going for the throat by trying to employ the doe eyes she threw at him to get her way.

"Daryl, I don't know why he wants it, but he obviously really wants it. Let him have it, please? As a gift to me, let him keep the animal. He's already named it," she argued.

"He named it Blue an' the damn thing's near enough blue that I don't reckon it was too hard ta give it a name," Daryl said.

"And you named your dog Dog," Michonne argued, "but didn't you still want that dog, even if its name wasn't perfect?"

Daryl thought about it a moment, but didn't respond.

"And if you take this mule away from Beau right now he's going to feel the same way you felt when your dad took that dog away from you. He's probably spent his whole day with that skinny thing following around behind him and in his head he's probably imagined how happy he's going to be with the damn thing," Michonne argued. "Please, Daryl…"

Daryl was a little taken aback. Michonne really wanted him to let Beau keep the mule. He could see tears building in her eyes, though he didn't know why it meant so damn much to her. She hadn't seen the thing for more than twenty minutes at most. He sighed and touched her cheek.

"I don't want ta make Beau felt like I did with my ole man," Daryl said. "I'll let him keep his stupid mule," Daryl said.

Michonne smiled.

"Thank you, Daryl," she said.

Daryl walked back over to where Beau was standing, stroking the head of the mule who looked bored.

"Ya got'cha self set on ownin' this old thing?" Daryl asked.

"I do," Beau said, looking at him with a look that Daryl hadn't seen before. For a moment he wondered if Beau was about to square off with him over the animal. He smiled trying to reassure him a little.

"Well, then, I reckon ya got yourself a flea bitten old mule, boy," Daryl said. A smile spread across Beau's face.

"I'm gonna practice throwin' loops again," Beau said, "an I betcha than if'n I practice an' Blue gets him a couple good meals, we'll even bring back a few more bulls ta top that ole cow," Beau said excitedly. "Might even rope us a few more cows ta bring back."

Daryl couldn't help but smile at the boy. He addressed all of them then.

"Fine, y'all did good today and tomorrow's gonna be a good day too. Go with Tyreese and get these here animals bedded down for a night and then come on back and let's get some supper. I reckon all three of ya earned that and a good bath for the day," he said.

He watched as all three of them started off leading their findings behind Tyreese. Daryl walked back over to Michonne and put his arm around her shoulder.

"That boy seems ta think that mule's a stallion or somethin' instead of the old bag a' bones that it is," Daryl said. Michonne turned to him and smiled.

"Beauty's in the eye of the beholder, Daryl. Most of the time we see anything that's ours as a lot better than everyone else sees it, but their vision doesn't take away from the beauty it holds for us. A lot of people might see you as just a dirty redneck, but you're my prince charming, and a lot of people wouldn't consider me much of a prize these days, but that doesn't mean that you don't make me feel like a million bucks. I don't suppose it will hurt anyone if Beau thinks that mule's the best thing he's gotten out of this world gone to hell," Michonne said.

Daryl chuckled at her and tipped her chin up to kiss her.

"Well hell," Daryl said. "Then I reckon the damn mule's gotta stay if ya think it means as much to the boy as you mean to me."

Michonne wrapped her arms around.

"I don't think it's the same thing," Michonne said. "And maybe that will come for Beau in time, but for now the mule will have to do."

"Come on, 'Chonne," Daryl said, wrapping his arm around her shoulder again. "Let's go get us somethin' to eat."


	99. Chapter 99

Michonne woke slowly, realizing that what she had thought was a dream was actually her reality filtering into her subconscious mind. Daryl was kissing at her neck, nuzzling the spot just under hear with his nose at intervals, his hands rubbing over her arm, breasts, and belly in a repetitive circular motion. She snickered as she came more into consciousness and realized that it wasn't a dream at all.

"What are you doing?" She asked, realizing that her own voice sounded hoarse and groggy from sleep. She couldn't stop the smile that was spreading over her face.

"Just wakin' ya up like I thought ya might want me too," Daryl said. "Gotta head out soon and then ya gonna be here all alone."

"Are you really going to try to catch a bull, Daryl?" Michonne asked. She pulled herself into a sitting position slowly and rearranged her pillows so that she could lean against them and sit back against the headboard. Daryl didn't change his position and he rested on his elbow just below her, glancing up at her. He smiled.

"Yeah, I reckon I is, 'Chonne," he said.

"What do you know about catching bulls, Daryl?" Michonne asked. She knew that the night before Daryl had made some sort of plan with Tyreese and Glenn on how they were going to get control of this bull who apparently wanted to remain ownerless, but as far as she could tell, not one of them had a clue what they were doing.

"Not a whole lot," Daryl said, "but I know that if we got us a cow and we got us a bull then we likely ta get the cow ta throw us somethin' when they're ready to roost up together."

"I don't think cows roost," Michonne said. Honestly she'd never studied the reproductive practices of cattle, though she was confident that Maggie and Beth might have a little insight to throw their way. Maggie had already been consulted by the three men on the best way to actually get the bull in the first place. Michonne felt confident that they would have taken her with them, but they didn't want to risk anything happening. Her range of movement in her right arm still wasn't what it should be, but it was healing. No one wanted to do anything that might jeopardize that, especially when they may need her in top condition later.

"I don't reckon they do neither, 'Chonne, but ya can call it what'cha want. We want 'em ta get frisky and I don't care what they want ta label it ass, they can call themselves friends for all I care," Daryl said. He sat up in the bed then, rubbing at his eyes. Michonne didn't know what time it was, but she could physically sense that it was earlier than they usually got out of bed.

"And what happens when we outgrow this place?" Michonne asked, wrinkling her brow a little. "We're going to have cattle and everything else around here. Our farm is growing, but the community isn't."

"I been thinkin' 'bout that," Daryl said. "I reckon we either gotta look for a bigger place or we gon' have ta work on addin' on here. If we gotta move on then we could steal some farm trucks, ya know? Load up the animals in some kinda big horse trailer an' get as far as we can like that. We'll butcher an' smoke whatever we can 'fore we go an' just keep the best pairs for breedin' when we get settled again."

"Like Noah's ark?" Michonne asked. Daryl shrugged.

"You got better ideas, 'Chonne? Besides, ain't nothin' we gotta figure out this mornin'. Rick and Sadie gon' work all day with some of the others gettin' us a place built to pen in that bull, but it ain't gonna be too fancy. Soon as he covers that cow we gonna eat him anyway, so he ain't gonna be no honored guest here," Daryl said.

"No, Daryl, I don't have any better ideas," Michonne said. Daryl stretched and yawned, trying to convince himself it was time to get up. "Come on," she said after a moment, "let's go on down and get you some breakfast. There's no telling when your cowpoke friends are going to be ready to head out on your adventure."

Daryl moved forward on his hands and knees and kissed her neck, nuzzling her ear again slightly and moaning.

"I thought ya might wanna fool around a little 'fore we left," he said.

Michonne sighed.

"How about a rain check?" She asked. Daryl sat back on his feet and made the same face at her he made every time she turned him down. She smiled. "I'm just not in the mood right now," she explained. "How about you go and get that bull and we'll see about it when you get home? I've never been to bed with a real live cowboy, might be exciting."

Daryl smiled at her and shook his head, rolling his eyes a little. Still, he looked satisfied with the offer and she knew she was more likely to be in the mood once she'd been up for most of the day. It always suited her better to wait until later, not being quite the same caliber of morning person that Daryl could be at times. He wasn't much for heavy conversation in the mornings, but he was definitely one who believed that morning loving made for good days.

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Carol was watching the hustling and bustling about. With the promise of a new arrival to the community that hadn't even been caught yet, it was all hands on deck. The normal things that had to be taken care of still needed to be done. Work on the barn wasn't complete yet and now there were new mouths to feed down there. Carol's job, so far at least, had been to get breakfast out to everyone. Now they were wrapping up their meals and slowly trickling toward whatever task awaited them.

She watched as Sadie and Rick went by with Jimmy and Junior in tow, wheelbarrows overflowing with wood to build a decent pen for their bull friend, a shelter being the last thing they would attempt to provide him with. Others bustled about readying to take on the day to day chores that weren't going to do themselves.

Beau and Libby had been two of the earliest to eat, and she spotted both of them coming toward her now as she stood near headquarters. Beau was leading his mule and Libby was walking along beside him, smiling about something. Carol couldn't help but smile at them. She had a sneaking suspicion that it might not be too much of a stretch to imagine that Beau was beginning to find someone besides Sadie an interesting member of the opposite sex, though she had to admit that he'd picked himself a tough one to tame if that were the case.

Beau brought the mule around, stopping it before the gates. He had already thrown across its shoulders some makeshift saddle bags.

"I didn't realize you were going on the bull hunt," Carol said to Beau.

"I ain't, well not exactly," Beau answered back. "Libby an' me, we aim ta show 'em where he's at an' then we goin' ta see what else we can find. Might can bring somethin' back or at least get an idea of where ta start lookin'."

Carol nodded her head. Beau was one of the members of the community that had a tendency to send himself on outings. Many of the others waited until they were given orders to go outside, but that wasn't the case with Beau. Ironically, no one really worried that much when Beau was outside the gates. Somehow the knowledge that the boy had survived so long on his own, coupled with the fact that he considered his stay in the community something he did purely out of want and not out of necessity for protection or comfort, made it easier to just assume that he'd be fine in whatever endeavor he undertook. In that way, Carol thought, he and Libby were clearly cut from the same cloth. She hadn't insisted on going outside on her own yet, but she had certainly put her time in out there before they'd run into her.

Carol turned and walked back toward headquarters a little. Michonne was walking toward her and a few steps behind were Daryl and Tyreese.

"Beau goin' out with us?" Daryl asked, walking up. Carol turned back to watch the boy scratching at the mules ears. The mule stood calmly in one spot, apparently not interested in moving until given the command. Just from the food that Beau had fed it the night before, and presumably this morning, the animal already looked better than it had the day before.

"He said he and Libby are going to show you where to find the bull and then they're going off to see what else they could find," Carol said. Daryl wrinkled his forehead a moment and then gnawed at his thumbnail, not really responding in any way. Carol didn't think that he would say anything. He wasn't one to dictate much of what the boy did as long as it seemed somewhat thought out and reasonable.

"Did you ever pass through North Carolina, Daryl?" Carol asked. Daryl looked at her, the wrinkle in his forehead deepening.

"Huh?" He asked.

"Did you ever pass through North Carolina?" Carol asked. "Say about twenty three years ago or so?"

"The hell ya talkin' 'bout?" Daryl asked. "I went huntin' there a couple times, I reckon, but I don't when the fuck it was."

Carol giggled at him and turned to Michonne who was smiling.

"Are you suggesting that Daryl might have taken back a deer and left something else behind?" Michonne asked.

"I'm just saying, two peas in a pod," Carol said. She could tell that Daryl caught on then and he made a face at her, but he didn't say anything. Glenn finally walked up, joining the other two men who were waiting.

"Ya ready?" Daryl asked him.

"Let's do this," Glenn said.

Carol and Michonne stayed put while the men went about gathering up the supply bags they'd packed the night before in case they needed to eat while they were out. They had a good deal of rope, as did Beau, but none of them were certain how much was going to be necessary.

"Let's go!" Daryl called to Beau who was standing with Libby beside their new companion. Beau hopped up on the back of the mule in smooth jump and then grabbed Libby by the arm, helping her to mount behind him. "Ya ridin' that damn thing out?" Daryl called.

Beau turned and nodded, but didn't say anything.

"Great," Daryl said, "now we get ta walk the whole way starin' at that thing's ass."

Maggie and Rachel were busy manning the gates at the moment, so they pushed them open and cleared the way of the few that would try to enter and grab at everyone waiting to pass through. Daryl stood back, Tyreese and Glenn matching him, and waited to see what would happen with Beau and Libby. He wondered if the mule would balk at the Walkers, but to his surprise it didn't. Beau nudged it forward with a gentle tapping of its sides and the animal started forward, hesitating for a moment, and then stepping between the Walkers as though they were there. Beau leaned a little and stabbed a Walker as they walked past.

"What d'ya know?" Daryl asked, starting after them.

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When they finally got to the place where the bull could be found, it was lazily wandering around a large pen eating grass. From a distance it didn't look like it offered any threat at all, or even that it might consider putting up a fight. Daryl thought it almost looked like you could walk up to it and slip the rope over its head without even breaking a sweat.

"He don't look like much," Daryl said to Beau. Both the boy and Libby had dismounted from Blue, leaving the mule wandering around and munching grass. It's motivation to travel without a passenger was so low that there seemed to be no reason at all to tie him, and apparently due to his exposure to them, Walkers didn't seem to spook the animal one bit.

"He looks like he ain't much," Beau said, "but ya just get close ta him an' you'll be whistlin' a different tune, I reckon. Ya ain't gon' get him no way but by ropin' him an' holdin' on 'til he decides he ain't pissed no more that ya done got a loop 'round his neck."

"We had him yesterday," Libby said. "Hooked him clean by tha horns, but he balked that off quick as look at'cha. Soon as he realizes he's done been had, he goes crazy on ya an' ya better hold on."

"We weren't aimin' to ride him back," Daryl said.

"Ya still gotta hold on ta 'im 'til he calms down," Libby responded. That ain't no small thing there."

Daryl nodded.

"Fine, I can tie a knot, but I'm not much good at ropin'. Still, I reckon between the three of us we'll get him. Y'all can go get on about whatever ya got ta do," Daryl responded. He watched as Beau went and collected up the reigns to Blue's makeshift bridle and the two got reseated. Then Beau waved at him and clicked at the mule, starting off in the opposite direction from which they'd come.

"Y'all ready for this?" Daryl asked, turning back to look at Tyreese and Glenn. Both had ropes in hand and had unloaded their packs on the ground, and both were looking at him like they'd slowly been convincing themselves that this idea was completely insane.

"I have never in my life thrown a lasso," Glenn said. "I just think you should know that going into this."

"Fair enough," Daryl said.

"And when I said construction was my deal," Tyreese said, "what I meant was construction and carpentry. I'm not sure if you got cowboy out of that because they all start with 'c', but I can tell you that it isn't the case."

Daryl nodded at him as well. He didn't know what he was doing any more than the other two men, but he knew they had to give it the best effort that they could. He went to work, while they watched the bull continue in his lazy grazing, preparing knots for the lassos. When he was satisfied with the knots he gave each of them a rope and took one for himself. When he was younger he'd played around with throwing loops, and once or twice he'd hooked his foot or a tree branch when he meant to, but he had a feeling that this was about to be greatly different, especially once their four legged friend was aware of their presence. His biggest hope was that they didn't have any Walker friends show up while they were doing this to add an even greater level of difficulty to the task at hand.

The three of them, after agreeing briefly on a perhaps ill thought out plan, decided to approach the animal from three different directions. Each would take their best shot at roping the bull. For lack of any other knowledge on how to go about this, they would simply repeat the plan until someone successfully got the loop over the bull's head and pulled it tight. At least the animal was penned, meaning that the run that it could take them on was limited at best.

"Just remember," Daryl said, "ya can drop the rope as soon as ya pull it tight. Once he calms down we can always go and get the end of it."

After about the fourth or fifth try with no luck whatsoever at getting a loop over the bull's head, Daryl was beginning to grow frustrated and starting to realize that the biggest flaw in this plan was that none of them were very good at this. The one who had come the closest to roping the animal was Glenn. For a moment it had looked as though his loop was going to find its mark, but at the last minute it just didn't quite make it.

The bull was aware of their presence now, though he didn't seem very concerned with it. Each time a length of rope hit him and fell off, he would look briefly in that direction and then continue munch, looking from time to time at one of the men. He seemed less bothered at the moment than if they'd been a swarm of flies.

Twice, to make matters worse, they'd been approached by Walkers, meaning they had to halt their activity with the animal, take time to put the Walkers down, and then return to their activity.

The bull, it seemed, was not bothered by the Walkers any more than Beau's mule had been. Daryl was beginning to suspect it might be something to do with the animals that had survived this long. Either they had survived this long because they weren't bothered by Walkers and had figured out some way to deflect them when they neared them, or they were simply accustomed to their presence, but having survived this long knew that they were somehow protected from them. Daryl couldn't answer the question for himself as to why the Walkers hadn't eaten the animals he found or why the animals weren't spooked by the living dead, but he knew there had to be something to it.

The day was wearing on and the men were beginning to give up hope. Daryl was considering that perhaps it wasn't going to be possible to gain ownership of this bull without someone who possessed at least some skill at the sport of roping. He wondered, even briefly, if Beau would pass by again. At least the boy had declared to have some rudimentary knowledge of the sport.

Finally, though, one loop made it clear over the bull's head. The shock of the moment was enough that Glenn, who happened to be holding the rope that made its mark, didn't think to pull the rope and tighten it immediately. It wasn't until Daryl shouted at him that he thought to yank his arm back to avoid the bull being able to pull out of it with ease.

As soon as Daryl yelled and saw Glenn yank the rope tight, he knew that Glenn had forgotten the first rule that they'd established. He wasn't going to drop the rope. Daryl's yelling startled the otherwise docile bull, and that coupled with the feel of the tightening rope around his neck, sent the bull into hysterics, and it sent Glenn on the ride of his life.

Daryl and Tyreese were pretty unsure about how to proceed. Both of them wanted to help their friend, but mostly all they could do was run along the outer fences and yell at Glenn to drop the rope that he was holding strong to. Daryl was impressed by Glenn's stamina, but he suspected that perhaps fear how now made it impossible for the Korean to let to go of the rope that was dragging him around and around the penned area that the bull was running in.

Eventually, however, the bull did what Libby said it would do and stopped. He'd given in to the fact that he was roped and had given up the fight. Daryl and Tyreese hopped the fences and rushed toward Glenn, who was lying face down in the ground, still holding with one hand to the rope. Daryl was the first to reach him, afraid that he might have been drug to death if that were possible.

Daryl rolled Glenn over and after a moment Glenn opened his eyes.

"Is he alive?" Tyreese asked, catching up to them and leaning over Daryl a little.

"I'm pretty sure he is," Daryl responded. "Glenn, ya alright? Can ya talk?"

"Tell me that he's still wearing the rope," Glenn said softly. He swallowed and stared at Daryl. Daryl smiled and then chuckled.

"Yeah, he's still wearin' it," Daryl said. "Ya got 'im. I reckon you're a cowboy now."

"Yee haw," said Glenn sarcastically, still not moving from his position.

"Is anything broken?" Tyreese asked.

Glenn started to sit up and Daryl helped him.

"I don't think so, but I don't know," Glenn said. He moved his legs and arms. Satisfied that they worked he reached his arm out toward Daryl. Daryl heaved him to his feet. "I think I'm fine…" Glenn said. He turned around and looked at the bull that had taken him on the run. It had returned to grazing, now not caring about the rope it drug around behind it.

"How are we going to get it back?" Tyreese asked.

Daryl scratched his head a moment and considered it. As much as he'd like to believe that the bull was a point now where it would simply follow idly along behind them, much as many of the other animals did, he had a sneaking suspicion that the animal wouldn't be so easy to transport.

"One of us is gonna have to lead him," Daryl said. "I reckon the best bet for the other two is to get on either side of him an' kinda fence him in that way so he ain't got the feelin' that he's got nowhere ta go but in one direction."

"Who does what?" Glenn asked.

"What do you wanta do?" Daryl asked. "You was the one he drug through the field so I guess ya get to have first pick a' the jobs."

"I'm leading," Glenn said. I don't want him whipping around and knocking me down or trampling me."

"Good point," Daryl said. "I reckon that means Ty and me's got the sides."

Daryl and Glenn started toward the animal, waiting as Tyreese opened the gate on one side of the bull's old pen and swung it open. He killed a few Walkers that had obviously been drawn by the commotion, and then he walked over to take his place on the opposite side of the animal from Daryl.

Glen gingerly picked up the rope he'd been holding onto earlier and started to pull gently at it. The bull stood still for a moment but finally took one or two timid steps forward. As Glenn continued to pull the rope, the animal continued forward, though he was making it clear that the pace he was setting was not going to be nearly as quick as the one that he'd employed in the pen. As they led the animal out of the pen, all three men broke off for a moment to shoulder their packs, one at the time, and then returned to formation.

"So far so good, right?" Glenn asked, calling over his shoulder.

"Just watch out for the horns," Daryl said, chuckling a little.

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The community had opted for a late dinner. Getting the bull back and getting it into the pen that had built for it was more of a task than Daryl or any of his helpers had imagined it would be. The animal was more obedient than it could have been, but he still hadn't been all about saying "Yes sir" to everything they suggested.

Once he was in the pen, though, he seemed disinterested in getting out. He lacked shelter, but that would be remedied as soon as possible. Daryl figured he could be placated momentarily with water and some of the feed that they had already stocked.

At dinner they told the story of how Cowboy Glenn had rustled that bull into submission, and everyone had a laugh. Even Glenn, who was clearly going to be black and blue from his adventure, found it hilarious to recount to the group exactly what he'd thought about while being drug around that pen. Though the ordeal had probably only lasted the better part of two or three minutes, he described it as having been at least an hour long.

Beau and Libby didn't return with anything they felt was worth mentioning. They'd loaded Blue with two bags of feed and a burlap sack of assorted items they'd found in an old barn, most of which would be used for his grooming.

"I did see me an old farm wagon," Beau said. "Hitch is broke on it an' it needs a couple a' panels, but I reckon I can go back for it an' get it fixed up. Then we can use Blue ta haul stuff we loot outta them farm houses an' barns we found. A lot of 'em was a good piece off tha road, but Blue, he ain't had no problem gettin' back there. He's all terrain, if ya know what I mean."

Daryl chuckled at the thought of that mule pulling a wagon around loaded down with whatever Beau and Libby found in some old farm cottages they'd located about six miles outside of town, but he didn't say anything. If they found feed and hay in the barns, it was better than nothing.

"We seen us some people too," Libby said. "They ain't said nothin' ta us, though, so we ain't said nothin' ta them."

Everyone's attention turned at the mention of new people. It was something that was always on the minds of everyone in the community, whether they spoke about it or not.

"How many?" Rick asked.

Libby shrugged.

"Don't know. Didn't count'em," she said.

"They was a group of 'em, I reckon," Beau said. "We only seen maybe five of 'em an' it was at a distance. We didn't get close to 'em on account a' not wantin' ta end up on the wrong end of a gun. They stayed their distance, an' we stayed ours."

"How far away was this, Beau?" Rick asked again, his forehead wrinkled.

"I reckon we spotted 'em 'bout three miles out, give or take. I weren't payin' all that much attention," Beau responded. "I weren't gon' worry 'bout 'em if they didn't try nothin'."

Rick looked at Daryl and Daryl could tell that he was worried about it. That wasn't a fair distance these days for other groups. Daryl still had fresh in his mind the group they'd attacked, the one that had afforded them Seth and the baby that Sadie had laid claim to. Still, there was no way of knowing without further inspection if this group was a peaceful group or not, and there was no way of knowing if they were camped somewhere close by or if they were passing through without making a special trip out to check it out.

"Maybe we oughta go tomorrow and stake 'em out," Daryl said. "See if they livin' 'round here or if they was just driftin'."

Rick nodded.

Daryl glanced around. It was evident most of the people in the room were concerned since many of them wore wrinkled brows, but their silence indicated that many of them were going to leave it up to him to decide what to do about their possible new neighbors. Daryl sighed. Knowing they were in the area bothered him, but the sun was already pretty well set and there wouldn't be any way of finding out more information tonight. The best he could do was organize a small party to go out at first light and see if they could determine what to expect from the people they had just been made aware of, and who were now surely aware of them.


	100. Chapter 100

**AN: This one is a relatively short one, but given the content of the chapter, it was the information that I felt needed to be contained in this chapter. That means that I cut it where it needed to be cut.**

**That being said, we've reached 100 chapters together! **

**I know that as you read fics it can be difficult to review and comment on everything you read. I'd like to ask you all now, though, as a favor, to take a moment and drop me some kind of review or comment. Let me know that you've made it here to 100 chapters with me, and (hopefully) that you're anxious to continue on with our group as they make their lives in this world of the dead.**

**The first 100 chapters have taken a lot of time to write and it's been a lot of work, but it has been exciting and fun as well. I hope that you're enjoying the story as much as I am and that you're as excited as I am (and I'm a little amazed, frankly) that we've managed to make it so far! I'm even more excited about what we've got still to come! **

**I hope you enjoy this chapter, and I hope you've enjoyed our last 100! **

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Daryl had fallen into a deep sleep almost as soon as his head hit the pillow. He hadn't realized how exhausted he was from the escapade with the bull until he'd gotten into the bedroom. He'd suddenly been so overwhelmed with the desire to crawl into the bed and pass into dreamful oblivion that he hadn't even bothered reminding Michonne that she'd promised him any sort of sexual encounter because he was too tired to consider it himself.

He was sleeping peacefully when he started to wake. As he was waking, he became slowly aware that something had woken him, though he wasn't sure what it was at first. There was a noise, but it was distant and muffled. Then, slowly, as he started to come further into consciousness, the clamor of the noise grew. Something in his mind was telling him that the noise was one that he needed to pay attention to. It was something that was important, something that he'd taught his mind to think of as important, but still it seemed unfamiliar.

Finally Daryl came into a waking state. The first thing he did was look around, noticing that everything seemed fine in his room, or at least it seemed like it normally did in the pitch black of night. He could hear Michonne sleeping, though she was making a fitful noise in her sleep that told him that she was trying to wake to the sound too, but it still had crossed from her subconscious mind enough to wake her entirely. She was battling with it in her sleep.

Daryl shook her, listening for the sound. He heard it start up again, almost as though it had taken some kind of break. Slowly the realization of what the sound was washed over him and he shook Michonne, jumping up to wrestle on his pants, not worried about the rest.

The sound that Daryl heard, the sound that his brain knew it should respond to, but which had seemed so strangely unfamiliar was the sound of the alarm system that they had put in place. Furthermore it was the simultaneous sound of several of the alarms that they had put in place. He didn't know what was happening, but they were being roused by every possible alarm they had.

As Daryl charged through the bedroom door and started down the stairs, knowing his crossbow would be on the wall by the door with the other weapons, he called for Tyreese. The man, wearing only shorts and as unconcerned with it as Daryl, was already taking the steps two at a time while Daryl was strapping on his knife. He grabbed for his crossbow and ripped the front door of the house open.

Immediately Daryl was struck by three sounds, those of the alarms, those of screaming voices, and those of the moans and groans of Walkers. It was dark outside, but there was an eerie glow that Daryl couldn't immediately identify. In the eerie glow he could make out more Walkers than he'd seen in a very long time. He backed up quickly and shut the door momentarily to get control of himself and soak in the situation.

"There's a fuckin' herd of Walkers outside," Daryl said. "I don't know how many head, but they ain't just a handful."

Tyreese stood in front of him now, armed and ready.

"Let's go," he said.

Daryl opened the door and the two of them started out. As he came off the porch, Daryl started stabbing at the Walkers. He suddenly wished he hadn't even brought his crossbow. Even with the orange glow, there was no way to accurately shoot it while enveloped in the darkness around him, and even if there were the Walkers were closing in too quickly to shoot anyway. This was hand to hand combat. There was no way around it.

Daryl made his way into the street, feeling his way with his feet. Once he almost fell because his foot caught on what he had decided to think of as a Walker. As he waded into the sea of Walkers, he realized that the eerie orange light was coming from high rising flames. The house that they had designated as headquarters all this time was engulfed in flames. The fire rose high above the roof, and Daryl could only hope that it didn't spread. Their house was the closest one to it, and though there was a decent space between them, he still feared that it would go up. He hated to think of Carol and Michonne trying to wade out into this madness with the girls.

As Daryl fought, trying to keep from tiring, the Walkers seemed to just keep going. In the darkness, Daryl could only see shadows. There were shadows of Walkers in the flickering light, but from time to time, as he got turned around in his desperate battle, he saw shadows that flicked and moved far faster than Walkers. From time to time he heard screams and shouts, war cries even. He knew most everyone was around him somewhere, fighting to save their homes.

Daryl searched his mind while he fought for an explanation. The only one that he could think of was that a herd had been passing through and pushed down one of the walls, though they had seemed secure enough during the day. That was the only way, though, that they could find themselves in such a large herd. They had to have pushed down the wall. Then the herd would have only grown, naturally, because the hoard of Walkers that typically lingered around the fences would have found their way around flooding in after the passing herd.

The fire baffled him, however. Carol was very particular about fires, and it wasn't like her to leave even embers burning after dinner. He wasn't sure how one could have started, but it was blazing hot, so he knew that somehow it had.

Daryl could feel his muscles straining now. He was tired after the day they'd had to begin with, and now he was running out of juice. He couldn't tell how many Walkers they'd killed or how many more were coming. He just kept swinging at any that got close to him and hoping that no one living walked into his path because he wouldn't be able to distinguish the difference right now.

Daryl heard shouting, and he heard a piercing scream, but he wasn't able to distinguish the voices as they rose up out of the other sounds around him. Suddenly from seemingly nowhere there came an explosion that startled Daryl. It sounded like a cannon blast at first, but then he realized that would be a ridiculous thing to hear. He thought about it for a second and realized that it was likely that the fire had reached some of the fuel that they'd stored up behind headquarters. He hoped that the explosion wasn't enough to spread the fire too bad. He risked glancing away from the Walkers at hand for a moment to look toward the burning building. The flames were still rising up, but it didn't really seem that the inferno was spreading too far. Some of the yard was clearly on fire, but he couldn't really see how much the flames had consumed beyond the now skeletal structure of the building.

Daryl heard a voice close to him calling out. He had no idea what the voice was calling, but he could at least identify it as Rick's. Rick wasn't too far from him, obviously fighting. He could only hope that whatever he'd said hadn't been a call for help because there was no way he was getting anywhere to help anyone. He couldn't see what he was doing, the Walkers weren't letting up, and he had to be careful not to lose his footing over the already still bodies that littered the ground.

Whoever had been sounding the alarm had stopped. It was probably Josh and Brenda. They were always on night watch and would have likely been the first two to notice when the fence fell and the Walkers had laid claim to the streets of the community. Daryl wondered how far the herd had spread out. He hoped, at least, that the noises from the alarms and the emergence of his group members from their homes had drawn all the Walkers into the same general area. It would be easier, then, to know when the threat was over. Until the sun came up they really had little hope of running around the community and locating any straggling Walkers, just as they had little hope of figuring out what to do about whatever part of their parameter had been breached.

Another explosion sounded off and Daryl cast his eyes once more toward the flames. They continued to lick the darkness around them, but they weren't progressing with any great speed and he hoped that the fire remained somewhat contained to the area instead of spreading. The good thing about the house they had known as headquarters was that it was situated somewhat oddly in the community. It had a larger lot than many of the other houses, and that had been one of the reasons they'd chosen to use it for its original purpose.

Daryl heard another scream rise above the other noises around him and he recognized the scream as Sadie's. Her screams had a very distinct sound to them and there was no denying that it wasn't a battle cry. Somewhere, Daryl was sure, she'd fallen victim to the herd.

Daryl tried to put it out of his mind, just as he tried to put out the other shouts and screams out of his mind. In the moment all that mattered was controlling the threat. There would be time to mourn and time to assess the damage once the Walkers had been cleared.

The area around Daryl began to open up some and the Walkers in his direct vicinity were beginning to dwindle. In one direction, toward the area where headquarters had been before it had become a charred skeleton still burning in the night, Daryl could make out bodies locked in combat with Walkers, but he couldn't tell who anyone was. He thought for a second that he made out the figure of Tyreese, but it was hard to tell. In the other direction, back toward the darker part of the street, Daryl could barely make out black shadows on a black background. He knew that there were people fighting there too, but he could make out even less detail about what figures belonged to people he knew, and what belonged to those that were trying to eat them.

He was beginning to feel optimistic about the herd a little. They were still coming at him, but not with the same speed and not in the same numbers that they had when he'd first made his way into the street. He began to move about with a little more freedom, though he still had to tread easy to keep from falling. This wouldn't be the opportune time to lose one's balance and topple down for them to descend upon you. No one would be likely to save you out here simply because no one would be able to see you and know that you needed them.

Daryl had begun to pursue Walkers now, moving about at the fastest speed that he dared. As the numbers were lessening he was becoming more and more aware of living people around him. Everyone wheezing and panting, the thick smoke in the air making it harder to breathe on top of exertion.

Then there was a series of smaller explosions. Daryl's brain struggled to identify the sounds, relating them back to the exploding fuel from earlier, but finally his blood chilled when he realized the sounds ringing out weren't explosions per se. The sounds that filled his ears now were the sounds of guns firing.

For a moment Daryl was incensed. It had been some time since they'd carried guns in the community. They kept them for emergencies when only a gun would do, but they didn't carry them and they didn't fire them. The threats they regularly dealt with were Walkers and they'd long since retired the use of firearms to take down Walkers.

But there they were, the echoing sounds of gunshots ringing through the community. For another second, Daryl wondered who would be firing and who would even think that it was a good idea. The noise would bring more Walkers through whatever place in the fence was compromised, and on top of that it was too dark to even know what you were firing at. Stabbing Walkers in the head at this hour was a challenge all its own due to the imprecision brought on by not being able to clearly see your target. You had to rely on instinct and touch almost, making guns truly impractical.

The shooting stopped and Daryl continued to try to make his way around, killing whatever Walkers he could see. The shots had done something to stir them up, just as could be expected, and now he felt like there were more of them again, like their numbers were building.

Then the shots rang out again. Daryl heard the sound of someone near him groan, and he realized that they'd been hit, though he had no idea at this point who it could be. People were scrambling in so many directions that it would have been impossible to figure it out. He considered trying to make his way in the direction of the person he'd heard, but then a searing pain tore through him and everything around him went blacker than it had been before.

When Daryl started to come to, everything around him made it sound like he was underwater. He felt like his head was fuzzy and he could hear a pounding noise that he quickly realized was the sound of his own blood pulsing through his veins. His head pounded and he slowly became aware that he was lying on the asphalt ground. He'd very probably knocked himself unconscious when he fell.

For a second he couldn't remember why he'd fallen or how he'd fallen. It was blurry and hard to piece together. He became aware, then of the growling of Walkers around him. He started to move, aware that they would close in upon him and devour him if he couldn't get himself together. He remembered now what was happening. There were Walkers, and guns being fired, and he'd ended up on the ground.

Daryl moved his arm, going in search of his knife. He'd dropped it, apparently, in the fall. His back hurt and he winced at it, realizing all too suddenly that he'd landed on his crossbow. He didn't want to imagine what it had done to his back at this moment. He had to find the knife. Daryl felt like he was moving far slower than he intended. Every muscle in his body seemed to protest even the smallest actions. He cursed himself for being weak, for being a pussy. He'd been shot before and he'd kept going, he wasn't going to let the nasty bastards eat him now for something like a simple gunshot wound and a fall.

Suddenly the Walkers that had been closing in on him stopped and fell forward. Two of them landed nearly on top of him and he heard the thud of a third landing nearby. Daryl reached his hand out, dragging it across the asphalt and across the form of a Walker. Finally his fingers found what they were searching for and closed around the handle of his knife.

Another Walker dropped just beside him and Daryl looked up, allowing his eyes to focus. He couldn't make out details of the figure that was over him, but the distant orange light from the slowly dying fire gleamed momentarily on the silver of a blade and Daryl realized that Michonne was only feet away from him, and the Walkers that had dropped around him had very likely lost their heads.

Daryl started to try to struggle to his feet, biting back the pain in his back and side. He could tell from the warm sticky touch of his side that he'd been hit there, but he imagined, now that he was collecting himself and wrestling to the standing position that it was likely only a flesh wound. Nothing major.

"What are you doing?" Daryl panted, only now letting it sink in that Michonne was circling around him taking down whatever Walkers came into the circumference that she'd established.

"Saving your ass," she said. "Are you OK?"

"Shot, but fine," Daryl managed. Her back was to him now and a Walker approached him. He stabbed it, wincing at the pain but not letting it cause him to black out again. "Ya shouldn't be out here," he panted, pulling the blade back out the Walker's head and holding to his side. Michonne didn't respond and Daryl turned, but she had disappeared into the darkness somewhere. Daryl cursed to himself and tried to steady his breathing, the smoke making it more difficult. He took down another Walker and tried to make out all that was going on around him.

A woman's scream echoed out, but Daryl had no idea who it belonged to. It wasn't Michonne's, he knew that much, because he'd have been able to identify her voice anywhere. He heard shouting again, at least two men, maybe three, shouting indecipherable words at one another.

Though they were getting closer and closer to the time when the sun would rise and thankfully cast some light on all that had taken place, the area around Daryl was growing darker. The fire from what had once been headquarters was dying down. It would likely blaze for some time, but it wasn't the blaze that it had once been. The lower the flames dropped, though, the darker the area surrounding it grew.

Daryl didn't know how long they continued to fight. He wasn't sure how many more Walkers went down or how much shouting and screaming he heard, but he felt like the madness went on for hours and hours on end. It couldn't have been that long, simply because his muscles wouldn't have lasted that long, he would have bled far too much in that amount of time, and the sun would have risen, but it _felt_ like that long.

Finally, though, it seemed as though an odd calm came over the community. Somewhere the sun was rising. It couldn't be seen, but enough of its rays must have been spilling over the side of the Earth somewhere to wash over them a little because Daryl began to notice that the world was moving from the monochrome black and white that he'd witnessed the battle in to also include a few shades of gray. He was beginning to make out more and more black shadows against a now dark gray background. The shadows that he could make out belong mostly to bodies heaped on the ground. They polluted the streets, or what he'd once known as streets which now seemed more like burial grounds.

The other shadows that he could make out belonged, he assumed, to his comrades. The souls who, like himself, had been out there fighting in the darkness for everything they had that they felt was worth fighting for. It was likely that they were all out there fighting for different people and for different reasons, but they were fighting nonetheless, and they'd been fighting together.

Daryl saw a handful of Walker shadows wandering about, but it wasn't long before one of the figures of his group members stepped forward and took them out. His head swam a little, but he fought back the dizziness. Now that calm was descending, now that people were stopping to get their breaths, and now that the dead had been laid to rest a second and final time, it wasn't time for giving into dizziness and exhaustion.

Now Daryl owed it to everyone who had been out there fighting to find the fallen ones, somehow, buried among the corpses of the Walkers. They'd have to pull together now not to fight, but to find the ones they'd lost. They needed to see if any had fallen that could still be saved, and they'd need to prepare those that were gone for burial and insure that they didn't rise again.

Daryl looked around him once again at the masses of bodies that littered the streets that he'd once thought of as safe, and his stomach churned. His heart clenched at the thought of the screams and shouts that he'd heard. He searched the figures around him, unable to distinctly make out any of them. He couldn't even tell who was standing, and that terrified him almost as much as the thought of who they would be left searching for.

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**AN: So, as usual, I apologize. As you know, I don't necessarily consider battles and action chapters a strength of mine, but in stories such as this they have to happen from time to time. I hope you enjoyed regardless. Let me know what you think! **


	101. Chapter 101

**AN: So now we begin the aftermath. There's so much to be dealt with here, both in way of things that need to be taken by the characters and in emotions that need to be looked at after the tragedy that it simply cannot be done in just a chapter or two. I'm attempting to break it up in such a way that things are dealt with thoroughly, but the chapters aren't overwhelming. That being said, I hope to eventually address all that needs to be addressed, but this will take a bit. Please don't expect it all to be resolved in just one or two chapters.**

**I hope you enjoy the story, even though right now is not the happiest of times for our little community. **

**I would also like to thank you for your reviews and support after the first 100 chapters of our tale. I'm glad to know that some of you are still on board! **

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Daryl may have stood there a few minutes, or he may have stood there for hours. Time was nothing but a blur for the moment. Around him there were so many sounds, so many voices, that they all ran together in one indistinguishable cloud of noise.

The air around him was thick and heavy with smoke. The smell of Walkers was strong enough to gag anyone who didn't have a strong stomach against the putrid smell of rotten flesh. He held his hand to his side. He was aware that it hurt, but the ache almost seemed dulled.

There was too much to think about, too much to take in. The sun was rising now and it was painting the scenery around him into a garish, blood soaked scene like something out of a nightmare. He felt like everything around him was broken, shattered into hundreds of little pieces and he could only take in one tiny piece at a time.

Slowly he began to feel like he was waking up from something, though he hadn't been asleep at all. Part of him felt numb. His brain felt numb. Now that it was beginning to wake up a little, the throbbing in his side announced its presence more than it had before. Breathing was difficult and he didn't know if it was because of the injury or because of the quality of the air, but he struggled a little against the momentary panic that rose up when he realized that he wasn't getting quite as much air as he wanted.

Daryl looked around, his eyes falling over the masses of bodies in the streets. He let his eyes gloss over the figures of his companions, some standing around, others already pushing the rotting corpses out of the way in search of the fallen. His first concern was finding Michonne. He couldn't begin to sort out all that had happened, all that needed to happen, until he located her. On his first quick scan of the area he didn't see her, but he knew she was out there. She had been standing near him. She'd come out with the rest of them, even though he wouldn't have wanted her to if she'd asked him, and she'd been fighting.

Suddenly the panic started to well up and Daryl cast his eyes over the group again, turning a little. He started walking in the direction away from headquarters, seeing that she clearly wasn't there. He heard others calling to him, but he ignored their voices, pushing them out of his mind. He'd worry about them later.

"'Chonne!" He called, trying to swallow down the panic. "Where the hell are ya, 'Chonne?"

"I'm here," Michonne called out. Daryl heard her voice and his heart stopped for a second. He looked around in the direction of her voice and finally spotted her in the dim light. She was sitting on the steps of Rick's porch, her katana laid across her lap. Daryl rushed toward her, ignoring everything around him.

"Ya alright?" He called out. She looked up at him, clearly exhausted.

"You're shot," she said. "You need to get that taken care of."

"Are ya alright?" Daryl repeated, ignoring her statement.

Michonne nodded.

"I'm fine," she said. "I'm fine."

"The baby OK?" Daryl asked, reaching a hand out to her to offer to help her up. She waved his hand away and pulled herself up with the steps' handrail.

"Fine," she said. "I think everything's fine. Daryl, you've been shot," she repeated.

"Yeah," Daryl said. "I know that, 'Chonne. Ya need ta go ta the house. Ya need to lay down."

Michonne nodded her head. Daryl realized that she was in as much of a stupor as he was at the moment. He wondered if anyone was processing, really processing, what was going on around them. He heard screaming, and he heard crying, but he still wondered if anyone was free entirely from the cloud of overstimulation.

"Let's get'cha back to the house," Daryl said. Michonne started walking in the direction of the house, picking her way over the fallen Walkers. Her katana was grasped in her hand and she held it out to her side. Daryl considered reaching for it and returning it to its sheathe since it was clear that the thought had escaped her for the moment. He left it alone, though, figuring that she would put it up when she got inside.

"Carol needs to look at you," Michonne repeated again when they'd reached the house. Daryl was relieved to see that the fire at headquarters had burned down a good bit. It was still a nice bonfire, and much of the lawn around it was burnt, but it appeared not to be much a threat anymore.

"I'll get her ta look at me, don't'cha worry 'bout me," Daryl said. "I need ya to promise that ya gonna go an' lay down. If ya do that, I promise that I'll get this taken care of. Then I gotta help everyone, 'Chonne, there's a lot that's gotta be taken care of."

Michonne nodded and started quietly up the steps to the house. She sheathed her katana as she reached the top of them and went into the house without another word. Daryl felt relieved, momentarily, at least to know where she was and that she was fine.

Once that problem was out of the way, Daryl felt overwhelmed again for the moment. There was so much that he needed to think about. How had the Walkers gotten into the community? Their entrance had to be repaired, otherwise they were simply waiting for another wave of them to crash down on what was left of the group. How had the fire begun? If it was an accident, then that was simply that, but if it was foul play then they had other problems that could threaten them further. Who had they lost? A scan around, even without comprehending the figures walking about, left Daryl hoping that those he could see immediately standing weren't the only survivors. They couldn't have been reduced to so few moving bodies…How many were injured and lost beneath the Walkers? The Walkers in themselves were a problem. They'd have to be burned, but that was a daunting task made even more daunting by the fact that they had to make sure that no one was trapped and needing assistance.

Speed seemed to be of the essence in the situation, yet Daryl felt like he and everything around him was moving in slow motion. So much needed to be done and he was having trouble deciding what the proper order was for everything. He started walking toward the gates where he spotted Rick standing, fidgeting with the lock. He continued to attempt to block out everything around him. He could only deal with one thing at a time right now, and Rick's help was something he felt like he needed if he was going to work out a plan for what needed to be done for everyone around him.

Daryl walked up to Rick, with Sadie standing near him, and Rick turned to face him, his hand still on the lock.

"What is it?" Daryl asked.

"Chain was cut," Rick said. Daryl noticed how calmly Rick said it and he realized that there were going to be at least two kinds of people to be dealt with, those that were calm right now and those that were in hysterics. He could hear the second kind of people around him, but they were going to be of little use for the time being if they wanted to get anything under control.

"So someone cut it?" Daryl asked. As soon as he asked it, he realized it was a stupid question. Clearly Walkers didn't cut the chain.

Rick nodded.

"At least two men, probably more," he said.

"How do you know?" Daryl asked. Rick gestured a little in Sadie's direction.

"They attacked her while she was trying to get the gate closed," he said. Rick pinched the bridge of his nose and looked around for a second. "There's one of them somewhere over there," Rick gestured not far from them. "I know I knocked him out. I don't know if he's dead. I don't know what happened to the other one."

Daryl looked around. They had been attacked by people. People had done this. Someone had deliberately done this to their community. It was even possible that they were somewhere now, either lurking or buried like some of their own under putrid Walkers.

Daryl turned back and looked at Rick and Sadie, both of which looked exhausted and disheveled. He realized that Sadie's shirt was wet with blood, and it was only then that it sunk into him that everyone was half dressed at best. Rick was wearing a pair of shorts, like he was, but Sadie was only wearing a light colored t-shirt.

"You're bleedin'," Daryl said. Sadie looked down as though she was unaware that she had any wounds that might be leaking blood. To his surprise, she hiked the bottom of her shirt up and he was thankful for a second that she was wearing underwear. Apparently she wasn't embarrassed at all about exposing herself. Down both her sides were deep scratches. She looked at them a moment and looked back at Daryl and then at Rick.

"How'd it happen?" Daryl asked.

Sadie shrugged.

"Don't know," she said.

"Fuck," Daryl said. They were scratches. Each set had been clearly made by three fingers. They were human scratches, or Walker scratches, it was impossible to tell just by looking at them.

Daryl looked at Rick. He had blood on him, and it was clearly smeared down his arm, but Daryl wasn't positive if it was his.

"Ya scratched too?" Daryl asked.

Rick's hand went directly to his shoulder and he wiped at it, showing Daryl the blood on his fingertips.

"Bit," Rick said. "Sadie bit me."

Daryl looked back at the woman. She didn't deny or confirm that she'd bitten Rick, but Daryl already knew she was a biter, so he didn't question the validity of the statement. Daryl shook his head.

"What the hell do we do, Rick? Where do we even start?" Daryl asked. Suddenly he was desperate for anyone that could help him find any answers in the madness. Rick looked just as lost as he was.

"We've got to get organized," Rick said with a sigh. "We've…we've got to get Carol and Mark, find a central place for the wounded," he looked in the direction of the rubble that had once been that place.

"We can use my house," Daryl said. "The downstairs is got enough space if we just move shit. We can get another place set up when everything calms down."

"Fine," Rick said. "So we need to get the wounded there, that's priority. Save who we can before we lose anyone else. Others can get to work taking the dead over for us to dig graves, and we've already got a fire here to start burning Walkers."

Daryl nodded his response. He glanced at Sadie again.

"What do we do with those that are…" he hesitated a moment, "with the people who got scratched and bitten?"

Rick looked at Sadie too. Everyone turned when they died, that was just a fact. Now that they knew that, now that it wasn't a surprise, being bitten or scratched just meant that you were going to expedite that process and die faster.

Sadie looked at both of them, apparently having caught on to Daryl's line of questioning. She held up her hand at him.

"I'm going to help. I can help move people, organize things. When the fever hits, I will disappear. Rick will loan me a gun. You can find me later."

Daryl bit his lip. He glanced at Rick, but Rick looked as if he didn't have an answer either.

"Just don't tell Mark," Sadie continued. "He has to stay focused to help. He can't be worried about me. Tell him afterwards, but let him see me helping, think that I'm alright, and he can do what he needs to do." Sadie smiled. "It's OK. Um…I'll take the baby to Michonne. I'll tell Mark to go to your house."

Sadie walked away and Daryl glanced back at Rick.

"Shot?" Rick asked after a second. Daryl remembered that he was holding his side. At this point he'd grown so accustomed to the pain that he'd almost forgotten it. He nodded at Rick. "You need to get that cleaned up," Rick said, "before you try and do anything else. Don't bleed out on us."

"Yeah," Daryl said. "I'm goin'. What about everything else?"

"Tyreese is over there, I'll talk to him. It looks like Glenn's got his hands full," Rick said, gesturing. Daryl turned and his eyes focused in on Glenn and Maggie sitting in the street. Glenn had his arms wrapped around Maggie and it appeared that any glue that had been holding her pieces together before was pretty much worn out now. Daryl vaguely remembered making his way around them earlier, and now he didn't even have to wonder what had happened. He nodded his head in response again and let his eyes drift over the scenery in front of him, still avoiding the details.

"Go get that taken care of," Rick said again. "I can hold things down out here until you're patched up enough."

Daryl started back toward his house. He saw Mark coming, Sadie just behind him, carrying the baby. He wondered how it was that she was so calmly holding it together. He wondered how he'd react if he was in the position of being scratched, just waiting for the fever to come. He supposed, as he thought about it, that perhaps he'd be like her. Perhaps he'd be trying to make plans. There wasn't anything else to do but sit and wait, and the waiting for it would be harder than simply keeping going until it was upon you.

Mark made his way toward Daryl. The man looked confused and Daryl didn't even have to question his facial expression. It was all too much for anyone.

"We gonna let y'all use the downstairs ta patch everyone up," Daryl said. "While they bringin' the others, can ya help me with this bullet wound? I need to get patched up enough to get out here and help 'em get this under control."

Mark chuckled a little, much to Daryl's surprise.

"Get this under control?" He asked. "Do you really think we're going to get it under control?" He glanced around.

"We gotta try," Daryl said, clapping him on the shoulder. Mark nodded at him.

"We've got some supplies in the storage house," Mark said. "I'll get what I can. Most of the medical stuff we had was in headquarters. We can do what we can, though."

Daryl didn't respond, and Mark started in the direction of the storage house. Sadie passed by Daryl without a word and made her way up the porch steps with the baby.

Rick and Tyreese came up next and Daryl could tell immediately that Tyreese wasn't himself. He looked like he was breathing hard, and his eyes were wide.

"Carol's missing," Rick said.

Daryl tried to let it sink in for a moment. He glanced around the people standing again. For some reason he'd just assumed she was out there, comforting someone or trying to help someone. When he realized that he didn't see her, he looked back at Rick. He'd already figured out that Tyreese was just barely holding together whatever he had left. Much like Maggie, another blow might send him off some kind of deep end.

"She's prob'ly in the house with 'Chonne and the girls," Daryl said. Tyreese shook his head, but he didn't say anything. Apparently he'd talked to Rick and that was all he cared to vocalize at the moment.

"Said she came out behind y'all. She's out here," Rick said. He glanced around. "_Somewhere._"

Sadie came back out the house and stopped near them. She touched Daryl on the shoulder to get his attention, her eyes asking him what was going on without any need of words.

"Carol's missing," Daryl said. "She's out here."

Sadie's face sunk, and she nodded her head. She began wading into the lake of Walker bodies, looking down toeing at them a little. The fact remained that they didn't know how many people were lost, nor did they have any idea where any of them could be located. The best they could do was do what Sadie was doing, attempt to wade through the Walkers and find any sign of humans underneath. If anyone under there was dead, they were likely to turn soon. Daryl cast a quick glance in the direction of Glenn and Maggie. He knew that they'd do what needed to be done, but he hoped they were quick about it so that nothing else tragic happened.

"Don't worry about it, man," Daryl said to Tyreese, trying to figure out what to say. "We'll find her. She's fine, probably hit or something. Mark's gonna take care of it. We just gotta look for her."

Daryl started to wade into the bodies and Rick started forward walking quickly. Daryl knew that he was taking inventory, attempting to talk to those who were searching or were comforting others. Mark approached Daryl just as he was leaning to shove a Walker over and check underneath to make sure that it was simply another Walker below it.

"You don't need to be doing that," Mark said. "I need to check that wound. You're going to get an infection and you could cause yourself to be hurt worse."

Daryl stood up, anxious to get this over with so that he could get back on the search team. He wanted to know how many people Rick had taken a tally of.

"Carol's missing," Daryl said, following Mark into his house. "It looks like you're on your own."

"Is she dead?" Mark asked. Daryl went the couch and lie down with his side facing Mark. Mark put down the box he'd been carrying and started burrowing through it. A few minutes later, Sadie came into the room carrying a bucket of water. Daryl looked at her, but she stood behind Mark a minute and put her finger to her mouth. Then she circled around and put the bucket down.

"Clean water," she said. "What else do you need?"

"Find out how many more are coming," he said. "We've got to make room for them."

Sadie nodded and disappeared. Mark began to clean Daryl's wound.

"Is she dead?" He repeated.

"Don't know, man," Daryl said, hissing at Mark's work. "Could be hit…I just don't know."

Mark was making clean work of cleaning Daryl's wound. The bullet hadn't gone deep, apparently slowed down by the mass of Walker bodies that had been surrounding him. He could only hope that the same could be said for anyone else that had been hit. He thought back to the fact that Rick said that he'd taken down one of the men, at least temporarily, but had no idea about the other. Daryl hoped that even though everyone was occupied, they would still manage to notice any strangers roaming about the community if the men were alive and on their feet. He didn't think they would be able to handle any more than they had now.

Rick came through the door a few minutes later supporting a limping Junior who had his arm around him.

"I think his ankle's broken," Rick announced, helping Junior to one of their living room chairs.

"Anything else wrong?" Mark asked, not turning his attention from Daryl.

"No sir," Junior replied. "I fell, got caught up in a pile a' Walkers."

"Fine," Mark said, "I can look at that in a minute. How many more we got coming in, Rick? Anything serious?"

"Tyreese and Beau are bringing in Seth," Rick said. "I don't think you can save him, though. He's hit in the back, but it looks like it might have gone through. He's barely even hanging on."

"Anyone else?" Mark asked. He was busy taping a bandage over Daryl's now cleaned wound.

"So far everyone else we've found is dead," Rick said. "Beth…and they found Josh, but that's all we've got. Carol's the only one we haven't found yet. Libby and Sadie are searching for her. Chelsea's been bit, she's with Stella. The fever's already hit her. She won't be with us for long now."

Rick kept himself composed. He gave the report with little more emotion than if he were reporting the scores of a football game. Daryl understood that at the moment that was the only way that it could be done. Mark was going to have to operate the same way. Until the crisis was over and the death toll was stabilized, they could only connect so much emotion to what was happening or risk everyone being too overwhelmed to be of assistance.

"What about the strangers?" Daryl asked Rick. "Did you find the man you took down?"

Rick shook his head.

"Haven't looked," he responded.

"Can I go now?" Daryl asked Mark.

Mark nodded his head.

"Just try to take it easy, don't tear those stitches. The wound isn't serious, though," he responded.

"We have to find those men," Daryl said. "I hope they's still alive 'cause I got a few questions for 'em."

He got up and started toward the door. It swung open before he could reach and he and Rick moved out of the way.

Beau and Jimmy heaved through the door carrying an unresponsive Seth, Rachel following close behind with her hands balled into fists, held just at her mouth. Tyreese pushed her into the door. In his arms he carried Carol who appeared more to be a rag doll than the animated version of herself.

"She's hit, but she's breathing," Tyreese called, as he came through the door.

"That can only be barely said here," Jimmy said, panting. "If he's breathin', it ain't by much."

"Get him in dining room, on the table," Mark said. "I'll see if there's anything I can do." The boys complied and made their way down the hall with him.

"What do I do with Carol?" Tyreese asked. He looked calmer now just by having found her.

"Put her on the couch," Mark said. "Tell her to hang in there. I'll get to her as soon as I can. Junior, I'm afraid you just fell to the bottom of the list."

"I'm fine right where I am," Junior responded.

Daryl looked one final time at Tyreese as he gently laid Carol down and turned to go out the door. He headed in the direction of the gates, determined to find the assholes that did this and get some kind of explanation. Outside there were Walkers to be burned, dead to be buried, and the death tolls were threatening to rise every minute.

Daryl started kicking through the Walker piles in the area that Rick had indicated, and Rick joined him.

"If they're fuckin' alive, I want 'em kept alive," Daryl said. "We gon' tie 'em up, and we gon' put 'em in one of them extra houses. They can fuckin' stay there 'til we get a chance to talk to 'em and find out what the fuck made 'em decide to do this to us."

"And then?" Rick asked.

"Then we're gonna fuckin' kill 'em," Daryl said. "I don't know how many there are, but if Maggie wants it, I'm gonna let her kill the one she wants. I suppose everyone else can draw straws if they want for what's left."

"Daryl," Rick said, "Stella is staying with Chelsea to make sure someone puts her down when she dies."

"Good," Daryl said. "I reckon it's better for her friend to stay with her."

He was trying not to think about the fact that both of them were just kids. Their little group had gone through a lot since they'd arrived at the community, and even before that really, and now they were faced with losing yet another. He didn't want to think about it because it made him even angrier, and already he was a little afraid that he'd break this assholes neck as soon as he found him if he wasn't already dead.

"I got one," Rick said. Daryl looked over at him and he was holding onto the sleeve of a man that was mostly buried under Walkers. Rick shoved back one of the Walkers and pressed his fingers to the man's neck.

"Alive?" Daryl asked.

"Yeah," Rick responded. "He's got a pretty nasty knife wound. We might not want to wait too long for this interrogation. Sadie said she stabbed someone, I guess this was him. He might not make it too much longer, if he ever comes too."

"Get some rope outta storage an' tie him up," Daryl said. He continued turning over Walkers in search of the one that Rick had apparently knocked out. He was beginning to fear that the man had died and would soon be turning.

"I will," Rick said.

"And bring me some for this son of a bitch when I find him," Daryl said.

Daryl continue to sift through bodies and finally came up with the man. He'd was beat up pretty good, but he had a pulse too, though it looked like he had a very nice head injury which may mean that he too would die before they could find out any answers to their questions. Daryl knew it would be too much to ask Mark to try to treat them just to kill them later, but he'd already determined that they'd scour the area for wherever they had come from if the two assholes didn't survive to tell them anything.

Rick came back and offered Daryl a length of rope.

"He ain't fightin'," Daryl said. "Could be close ta gone."

Rick busied himself tying up the man that he'd found.

"I don't know if there's any saving them," he said, "but we can try to bring them out of their stupor enough to find something out."

"I don't think I'm gonna sleep tonight if we don't know nothin'," Daryl said.

He stood up and looked at the two men slumped on the ground. He'd originally planned to take them to one of the distant houses for questioning, but now that seemed like too much work, and it seemed like it was too good for the men, assuming they ever even recovered consciousness.

"Let's just leave 'em here," Daryl said. "We can drag 'em over there. We'll see if we can't get 'em to come to, but we ain't gotta carry 'em nowhere."

Rick nodded, agreeing with Daryl. There was too much that had to be done to give themselves extra work.

"I was going to say earlier," Rick started, dragging his man over to the charred grass near where headquarters had once stood, "that I'd like to offer to watch Sadie tonight. Mark's probably going to be busy because if Carol and Seth live through the night it's only going to be luck and vigilance. I can stay with her, be there to put her down if she can't go through with it or doesn't want to."

Daryl stopped a minute.

"You sure you wanta do that, Rick?" Daryl asked. He knew that Rick had been developing feelings for the woman, and though he'd been trying to avoid saying anything about it, now he felt like it might need to be addressed. Rick had only just begun to come back from what had happened with Lori. His relationship with Sadie was barely existent at best, but Daryl worried that even the slightest hiccup right now could send him reeling back into whatever he was just beginning to come out of.

Rick stood there a moment, not really looking at Daryl. He wiped at his forehead with his arm and it did very little good, only spreading a little of the dried blood from his arm across his sweaty forehead. He nodded.

"I feel like I _need_ to do it," Rick said. "Mark is going to be busy, and he doesn't need to be distracted if we can avoid it. Sadie shouldn't have to do it alone if she doesn't want to, and she doesn't deserve to turn into one of them. I'm going to make Carl stay with Beau. I'll take care of it."

Daryl could see the resolve in Rick's face, and though he didn't really like the idea, he determined that he wasn't going to argue with Rick. Perhaps it wouldn't come to that anyway. Perhaps she'd succumb to the fever during the day, while they were all trying to make some kind of sense of their situation, and Daryl could take care of it, or Tyreese, and then Rick wouldn't feel the need to go through with his plan. For the moment, however, Daryl wasn't going to fight with him. He simply nodded and Rick nodded in response.

"Help me move a couple a' these Walkers to that fire," Daryl said. "We might as well use it and start to burn a few of 'em. Keep people from breakin' their necks moving around out here."

Rick stepped forward and helped Daryl drag one of the bodies over, heaving it onto the burning remains of headquarters. As they made their way back for another, Daryl realized this was going to be one of the longest days they'd had in some time.


	102. Chapter 102

**AN: Here's the second aftermath installment. As I said before, there's a lot to work through here, so it's going to take a bit. I'm sure I won't address every point that everyone would like to see addressed, but I'm going to do the best that I can. I may try to get another chapter out tonight, but I've got a lot to do today.**

**For those of you that read my other fics, I'm interrupting my update schedule a little as I continue to work through some of the situation at hand here. It's best to go with it when it's on my mind so that I don't lose my train of thought entirely. **

**I hope you enjoy! **

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As the day wore on, people had become clearly divided on their tasks. Beth and Josh had been cleaned up by their loved ones and loving wrapped in sheets. Daryl had left Glenn to handle Maggie and left Brenda with Josh, upon her request. When they were ready for assistance, Tyreese and Rick had moved the bodies to the graveyard area where Beau and Jimmy had dug graves for them.

Then had come the problem of exactly how to handle the funerals. The reality of the situation was that the community seemed fractured at the moment. Mark was occupied with his patients, not being positive that he had the ability to save neither Carol nor Seth. Sadie was still hiding her wounds from everyone. Chelsea had been overcome already by the fever, but she hadn't passed, and no one was going to force her to take any way out that she didn't want to take. She had the right to go how she wanted, and if she wanted to wait until the fever finally burned her out, then that was how it was going to be. Daryl wasn't sure, though, if they should go ahead and bury the two that waited, their loved ones camped by them, or wait until there were more and bury them all at once.

"We need to get them in the ground," Rick said when Daryl addressed him about the issue. "We can't leave them laying out the entire day while we wait to see who else is going to die. We leave Mark doing what he can, let the others come if they want, but we get those two in the ground. I say that we call everyone together, someone can say a few words, and we let Josh and Beth be laid to rest. We bury the others when the time comes."

Daryl nodded, agreeing with Rick. He set about collecting everyone up. It wasn't until he ventured into his own house, the last he had to visit, bypassing the mess that had become his living room, and made his way upstairs to wake up Michonne that some things started to sink into him. He'd heard Michonne upstairs a few times with the children. She had the girls and Paul in her care currently. She hadn't been downstairs, though. She would be unaware of who they were going to bury, she wouldn't know that the reason she had Paul was because Sadie wanted him to be out of her reach were something to happen and she turned, and she wouldn't know that Carol wasn't downstairs tending the wounded with Mark, rather she _was_ one of the wounded. Daryl also realized that they hadn't eaten all day.

They had fires going on either side of the street, one being what was left of headquarters, and the other burning in the street on the other side, for Walkers. They'd been trying to burn them as quickly as possible, but still there were a lot of them left.

In the mess they'd also located another person that apparently belonged to the attacking group, though he wasn't fairing any better than his friends, having been shot by his own group. They'd tied him up and put him with the other two, but so far none of them had come to for them to be able to question them. Daryl was beginning to seriously doubt that they would.

All the excitement, however, had brought the day to day life of the community to a screeching halt. No one had remembered even the simplest of things, like the fact that they needed to eat. Daryl realized it was something that was going to have to be addressed. He didn't want anyone unable to function because they hadn't taken the time to give their body what it needed. They needed everyone in the best possible condition that they could be in right now.

He especially worried, suddenly, about Michonne and the girls. She hadn't been down to get food for them either. He knew there was some assorted jars of baby food in the nursery, but he doubted it was enough for both of them, especially since they were accustomed now to eating actual meals. He also knew that Michonne typically breastfed Paul when she kept him, the baby having adjusted to feeding from both her and Sadie, and he worried that she might not keep her strength up if she continued to do that without eating.

"'Chonne," Daryl said, opening the bedroom door. Judith and Hope were playing in the floor and both of them got up immediately and came rushing toward him. He patted them both on the head, but didn't pick either up, not feeling like starting any kind of war for attention at the moment. Michonne was lying in bed with Paul, her eyes closed. The little boy lie beside her, awake but quiet. "'Chonne, ya need to wake up," Daryl said, gently shaking her. Michonne's eyelids fluttered open and she looked lost for a minute before adjusting.

"What's wrong, Daryl?" She asked. Daryl didn't know what his facial expression looked like. He couldn't imagine with all the thoughts that had been running through his mind throughout the day. He imagined that if he looked anything like everyone else he'd been in contact with, then he probably looked a little lost and a little confused.

"'Chonne, ya need to get dressed. We gotta have a funeral and ya probably gonna wanta be there," he said softly.

Michonne sat up a little, disturbing the baby who made a noise, but didn't cry.

"Who's dead?" Michonne asked. Daryl noticed that her eyes were already filling with tears and she didn't have a clue who was lost. She'd probably been imagining the worst the entire time she'd been hiding up here.

"It's Josh and Beth," Daryl said. "They been gone since this mornin', so we gotta lay 'em ta rest. Ya need to get dressed now."

Michonne didn't cry, at least not any audible sobbing, but Daryl did notice that her eyes released the tears that were building up just behind the lids. She nodded and got out of the bed, making her way to the dresser. Daryl hovered around the door, listening to the conversations below, and considering how he'd explain to her everything else that was going on. He had to tell her about Carol, but he wondered if she needed to know about Sadie now, or if he should wait and tell her when everyone else would find out about it.

"Daryl," Mark called up the stairs, "I need to talk to you for a minute."

Daryl could hear Rachel audibly sobbing below and he already knew what it was that Mark was going to tell him. Seth was going to be joining Josh and Beth today.

"Ya need to talk to Beau," Daryl called down. "He'll help get things ready."

Daryl didn't feel like he was prepared for the position that he was in right now. He didn't know what to do. So many people around him were so emotional, they needed things from him and he wasn't even sure what they all needed, less likely how to give it to them.

"'Chonne," Daryl said, turning his attention back to his wife that was struggling into some of her clothes, half dazed, "we just lost Seth."

Michonne looked at him, her face blank for the moment. He wondered if everyone felt overwhelmed right now. He was beginning to think that was what the blank stare translated to.

"There's somethin' else ya gotta know," he said. Michonne had frozen now, but she continued to stare at him, her eyes still pooled with tears, but no sound whatsoever escaping her. "Carol got shot, 'Chonne. She ain't lookin' too good. Mark's doin' what he can, but we don't know what's gonna happen."

Michonne stood there, still frozen, for a moment. She didn't say a thing. She went to the bed and scooped up the baby that was laying there, unaware of everything that was happening.

"Can you take the girls?" Michonne asked. Daryl noticed that her voice shook a little, but nothing besides the few tears rolling down her cheeks showed any emotion.

"Sure, 'Chonne, I got the girls," Daryl said. He decided she didn't need to know anything just yet about Chelsea being bitten or Sadie being scratched. It was too much for him to take in, and it was too much for her.

By the time that Daryl made it downstairs with the girls, and Michonne followed silently behind him with Paul, they had already taken Seth out of the house and Mark was alone with Tyreese and Carol. They didn't pass into the room where he was at, but Daryl did stop before reaching the front door and call to Tyreese.

"Ya comin'?" He asked.

"No," Tyreese called. "I don't want to leave. If she comes to, even for a minute, I want to be here."

Daryl nodded to himself, but didn't respond verbally to the man. He waited for Michonne to pass in front of him and open the door and he followed behind her.

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Most of what was left of their community gathered around at the three graves. Stella had stayed behind with Chelsea, Mark and Tyreese had stayed with Carol, and Junior was temporarily bedridden on pain medication that Mark had given him, but everyone else had gathered together. Michonne had taken Hope from Daryl, passing Paul temporarily back to Sadie.

It was decided that Rick would say a few words, since he offered, and everyone listened as he spoke in general about the three that they were laying to rest. Then he offered the opportunity to anyone who wanted to speak to share something. Brenda had taken a moment to remember Josh. She was clearly the one who had known him best since the two of them had dedicated most of their time to each other voluntarily becoming the night watchmen for quite some time. Daryl knew that they had been the ones to sound the alarms that brought everyone out the night before, and he wanted to ask her what had happened, what they had seen, but he knew that would have to wait until she'd had some time to calm down. She clung now to Rachel who also took a moment to speak about Seth.

Daryl was surprised when Glenn was the one to speak about Beth, but Maggie was too overcome to talk. She clung to Glenn, looking pale and very unlike herself. Daryl was worried about her, but he knew that it was difficult to lose a sibling, and Maggie and Beth had been very close. It also wasn't lost on him that Beth had been the final tie that Maggie had to her life before all this insanity had happened, and that likely made it more difficult.

When the words were through, everyone began to break away and go back to the tasks that they'd been doing before. Daryl lingered a moment, waiting on Michonne who had gone over and grasped Maggie in an embrace. When she'd finally broken away, and Glenn had begun to lead Maggie back toward their house, Daryl approached Michonne.

"Ya gotta eat," he said. "We all gotta eat sometime."

Michonne looked at him as though the idea of eating had escaped her entirely. She nodded after a minute.

"I can make food," she said. She started walking and Daryl followed behind her carrying Judith who was beginning to get antsy. He decided the child was very probably hungry, and her requests for her parents weren't helping the situation any.

Michonne stopped before she got to headquarters and stood facing the burning fire that they were keeping going now for Walkers. She pressed her hand to her forehead.

"We've got to find some pots," she said. "There are some in our kitchen. We need pots if I'm going to start a fire to cook something."

"I can get us pots," Daryl said. He suddenly became aware of Sadie that had come up behind him. She was flanked by Libby. "We gotta eat," he said facing both of them. Sadie nodded at him.

"We'll make food," she said. "We can feed everyone. It's OK." Sadie handed Paul to Daryl and he stood awkwardly trying to balance Judith on one hip and hold the baby in the other arm. His side was throbbing from having carried both the girls earlier and now from this strain.

"'Chonne," he said. "Help me put Jude down. I gotta have a break."

Michonne put Hope down and came to take Judith from him. Once both girls were on the ground, they began to start whining. Hope reached her arms up toward Michonne and Judith started to run away as though she was making some monumental break for it. Daryl sighed.

"Jude, back here," he called. The little girl turned around and looked at him.

"I eat now," she said.

"I promise ya, we gonna get'cha somethin' ta eat," Daryl said. "But ya gotta come here and stay with Hope."

Judith came back for a moment and Daryl hoped that she would quietly wait for her promised food. She was great about waiting when Carol promised her things. She'd sit quietly for hours even, as long as Carol promised her that whatever she wanted was coming. She wasn't however, always as patient with everyone else. Daryl was beginning to worry about how they were going to handle that situation. He hoped Tyreese had some kind of idea in mind, because he was lost.

Sadie reappeared a few minutes later with pots. Daryl watched a moment as she took them to the yard in front of one of the storage houses and put them down. She addressed Michonne and he quit paying attention to the women.

"I'm goin' ta help with the Walkers," he called. Michonne turned and looked at him. "I'm leavin' ya with the kids, but let me know if ya need help." Michonne nodded and Daryl walked off to drag more bodies to the fires.

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Somehow Sadie, Michonne, and Libby pulled a meal together. Daryl was in awe because by the time they called everyone to eat, they were surrounded by four hungry children, and Paul had decided to protest every single second of his life from where Emma sat holding him. Daryl didn't know how they'd all kept their sanity and cooked enough food for anyone who wanted it to eat.

"I'll deliver plates," Beau offered, realizing that a good number of people were not coming to eat. Those that were coming were taking plates and sitting on the ground, but for the most part the mourners were in hiding.

"That's sweet of you, Beau," Michonne said. "We would all appreciate it if you'd do that."

Jimmy quickly stepped up and offered to help Beau, even though both of them were visibly exhausted from the burials and from moving Walker bodies.

Everyone looked exhausted and Daryl thought he was more tired than he'd ever been before. He almost slumped on the grass, sitting seemed impossible for the moment. Hope crawled on him, smashing her hand into his already throbbing side and he pulled her onto his other leg. His side throbbed, his head throbbed, and he wanted to sleep more than anything. He just wanted this day to end. It felt like some kind of nightmare, and part of him believed that if he went to sleep inside the nightmare then he'd wake up and none of this would be true.

"We forgot to go and get water today," Michonne said. She stood over Daryl holding her plate.

"Ya gonna sit?" He asked.

Michonne looked almost like she was going to cry.

"I don't think I can," she said. "I don't think I can get down there, and I don't think I can get back up. We didn't go to get water," she repeated. "We can't wash the dishes. Everyone needs a bath and we don't have bath water." She started to tear up then. "Mark needs more water and we're almost out. We've got to find more buckets. There were only two that we had that didn't get burned in the fire."

Michonne stood there for a moment, sucking back tears, her plate still balanced in her hand. Daryl wasn't under the illusion that she was really crying about water. Yes, it was a legitimate concern that they didn't have it and they needed it, and he wasn't really sure who would be going out to get it, but they'd send someone. He'd go himself if he had to, and he would find a way to carry it back. Daryl realized that this was simply something that Michonne had grasped onto. It was the smallest thing that she could make into the most terrible situation ever. It was something, anything, that could make some sense in the madness. He figured it worked much the way that Sadie had grasped onto the thought that she had to simultaneously be involved in helping with every single thing that was happening. They were trying to focus on what didn't matter so much in order to avoid thinking about what it really was that was bothering them.

"'Chonne, we'll get water," Daryl said. He put his plate on the ground and moved Hope in front of it. The little girl was busy eating and hardly noticed the change. She looked at him for a moment when he pulled himself to his feet, but then went back to feeding herself with both her hands.

When Daryl got up he put both his hands on Michonne's shoulders. He didn't know what to tell her. If he said that everything was going to be alright, he'd be lying. He had no idea what was going to happen. He had no idea how they'd all recover from this. They would, he knew it was true, they'd recovered from so much and this was just another situation, but it wasn't going to be something that happened overnight and he realized how dramatically their lives could be changed.

"We got chairs in the storage house, 'Chonne, ya want me ta get'cha one?" Daryl asked.

Michonne wouldn't look directly at him. She was glancing in every direction but in the direction of his eyes, and if he moved his head to get her attention she simply moved her eyes in the other direction. Daryl sighed and walked away. He came back a few minutes later carrying one of the chairs and put it down near Michonne. She went and sat in it, thanking him quietly and balancing her plate on her lap.

"Just eat, 'Chonne, I'll make sure the rest gets taken care of," Daryl said. He started to take his place back on the ground beside his daughter, but decided that he should probably go and get another plate. His had dirt in it now, but that wasn't deterring his offspring any. Apparently she'd been a lot hungrier than she'd let on to anyone because he was shocked to see how much of the food was gone and she was still steadily cramming her mouth with it. "Hope!" Daryl called. Hope's head shot toward him, her hands partway to her mouth, her fists loaded with beans. "Ya gotta chew," he said, softening his tone. He realized she had that look on her face that she got when she was deciding if she was about to be in trouble. She continued to look at him a minute, chewing. He smiled. Despite everything that was going on, that face could always make him smile. She said something to him, her mouth so full that he had no chance of understanding it, and lost most of what she was chewing. "Just chew," he said.

Daryl turned and went to get another plate. Beau came walking up. The boy looked as tired as Daryl felt.

"I took 'em plates," he said. "Chelsea's gone. Stella put her down 'fore she could turn an' she's askin' for water ta clean her up."

Daryl handed the plate he'd been waiting on back to Sadie.

"We gotta go get water, boy, we ain't got none here an' everybody needs it. Go get Carl an' see if Jimmy can come," Daryl said.

Beau nodded but didn't respond. Daryl sighed. He directed his attention to Sadie who was standing there, looking confused.

"Goin' for water," he said. She nodded and offered him a halfhearted smile. "How ya feelin'?" He asked. Sadie shrugged.

"Fine," she said. "Tired, but so are you." Daryl wanted to reach out and touch her forehead, to see if there was any fever there, but he knew the movement would draw attention and Sadie didn't want that.

"No fever?" He mouthed, realizing he had no reason to actually speak to Sadie. She shrugged her shoulders and shook her head. Daryl nodded in response.

When Beau returned with Jimmy and Carl, Daryl informed Michonne and then Rick that they were going for water. Daryl knew there were some buckets down near the field and he thought he remembered there being buckets in the barn that was still under construction. They went quietly in search of them, only speaking once at the barn to note that someone needed, before nightfall, to feed the animals and water them. What was left of their crops that hadn't finished making yet would have to skip a day of watering. There wasn't enough manpower and there weren't enough hours left in the day to handle everything they'd forgotten to do.

11111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111

The rest of the day wore on, everyone getting more and more exhausted. After the first water run of the evening, everyone that could gathered to pay their respects to Chelsea and Rick helped Beau and Jimmy, both of whom were running in slow motion now, to dig a grave for her. Stella spoke for her, reminding the group of the journey they'd been on before they were found hunkering down in the storage room of a store full of Walkers that had been put down. She reminded them that Chelsea had been just a girl when the whole thing started, like any other girl, and then Stella pulled what little resolve together that she had and helped Rick and Sadie cover over the grave while Libby and Emma passed around the community handing out water. When the water was gone, Daryl organized for them to go on a second run, wondering how they'd even make it back.

They did make it back, though, and slowly the final moments of the day were coming to a close. There were still Walkers to be burned. There were messes to be cleaned up. There were people to be comforted in ways that no one knew how. There were three men slumped on the street, barely alive, that held the secrets as to why this all had happened to their community. There was still so much to be done.

Daryl found Rick filling a bucket with some of the warmed water that was left.

"I thought I'd take this to my house," Rick said. "I need to get cleaned up, and Sadie's filthy too. We can bathe. I doubt that either of us is sleeping tonight."

"She ain't got no fever yet?" Daryl asked. Rick shook his head.

"Nothing yet," Rick said.

"Do ya reckon the bites are quicker than the scratches?" Daryl asked. Rick shrugged at him.

"I don't know," Rick said. "I'm hoping that the scratches were from the men. At this point she's been so active that I can't feel like she just hasn't worked the virus through her system yet."

"We can hope," Daryl said. "What we gon' do with those three assholes? We gonna leave 'em out here?"

Rick looked over in the direction of the three men that were slumped on the ground. Moving them would be a pain in the ass, that much was true, but leaving them there just didn't seem right either.

"We need to put them in one of the extra houses. We'll take care of them tomorrow. If they die during the night we don't want more Walkers wandering around this place. At least they'll be locked up in a house," Rick said.

Daryl nodded and set about calling reinforcements to help them drag the men to one of the houses for safe keeping.

11111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111 

Daryl escorted Michonne and the girls into the house. Sadie followed behind them with Rick, carrying Paul. She had insisted on coming with them, not revealing to Michonne why she wanted to. When they came into the living room, Mark was asleep on the couch and the house was silent. Sadie passed the baby to Daryl and went over and shook Mark gently. He jumped at first and then calmed.

"Is everything OK?" He asked. Sadie smiled at him. She nodded.

"How is Carol?" She asked. Mark looked at her, sleepily.

"Tyreese has her in the bed upstairs. I made him tie her hands up, just in case. She came to a little, but only for a few seconds. I guess it's for the better right now," Mark said. "Everyone else?"

Sadie shook her head.

"Everyone else that was hurt is gone, except the boy," Sadie said. Mark nodded after a second.

"A broken ankle isn't fatal," he said. Sadie shook her head.

"Are you sleeping here?" She asked. Mark nodded.

"If I've only got one patient left, I might as well not leave my post," he said. Sadie nodded again and sighed. She looked back over her shoulder where Michonne was standing beside Daryl, holding Paul. Daryl felt bad because he knew what was coming and he knew that Michonne thought that Sadie was only there to check on Mark.

"I am leaving Paul here tonight," Sadie said. "I'm going to stay with Rick."

Daryl could see the confusion on Michonne's face and on Mark's.

"I got scratched last night when the Walkers came. We don't know if it was a Walker or a person. I'm going to go with Rick and he's going to stay with me in case the fever comes," Sadie said, looking at Mark. "Michonne will take care of Paul until you can take him, but you have to take care of him. He's going to need you."

Mark grabbed her wrist as she was stroking the hair at his temple. He looked more confused than he had before.

"What? Sadie, you're not sick," Mark said. Sadie smiled at him. She shook her head.

"No, not yet. It's OK. What happens, happens. You have things to take care of here, and I will be fine," Sadie said.

Mark sat up a little and started looking at her arms. Sadie sighed and pulled up her shirt to reveal the scratches that they'd seen that morning, most of the dried blood still caked on them, now mixed with dirt.

"Jesus, Sadie!" Mark declared. "What are you thinking?" He grabbed her face and held it right in front of his. "How could you let these go like this? These aren't Walker scratches! If you were Walker scratched you'd know it, don't you remember when Hannah got scratched? She was delirious within four hours. You're going to get sick, though. If these aren't already infected they will be!"

Sadie put her hands on his shoulders and pulled herself from him.

"It's OK. I'll clean them. We'll know by morning what they are," she said. "You just promise me that you are going to stay here and that you'll take care of Paul."

Mark turned then to Rick.

"If you're taking her then you clean these," he said. "Don't you dare let her do anything that's any more stupid than what she's already done by not doing anything about this."

Rick nodded his head.

"I'll make sure they'll clean and I'll stay with her until morning," Rick said.

Sadie didn't wait for Mark to get anymore worked up. She leaned over and kissed him on the forehead and got up from the couch. She passed by Daryl, touching him lightly on the shoulder and walked over to Michonne who had passed Judith to Rick and was holding an almost sleeping Hope. Daryl noticed that Michonne was choosing to remain as silent as she had throughout most of the day and he wondered when she was going to open up to him about the entire situation.

"If something happens," Sadie said to her, "help Mark with Paul. He's a good daddy, but he needs help."

Michonne didn't respond, but she nodded. Sadie passed back by Daryl and gently kissed the baby in his arms who was now sleeping peacefully, completely unaware of his surroundings.

"I'm going on the porch," Sadie said to Rick. "Put Judith down for them, and I will wait for you."

Rick nodded and started toward the stairs. Daryl and Michonne followed him. As they were headed up the stairs, Daryl heard the door close and knew that Sadie had stepped outside.

In the nursery it didn't take long for the children to agree to sleep. Paul was already out and Hope was nearly there when Michonne put her into the crib. Judith protested a moment when Rick stripped her down to her underwear and put her into her little bed. She wanted her parents, and Daryl realized she'd been the entire day without either of them, and now she was beginning to really realize it, but she gave up her protest when Michonne came over and offered her the duck that she slept with and rubbed her for a moment, promising that her Ma Ma and Da Da would be in to check on her soon.

"Ya lied to the kid," Daryl said to Michonne when they exited the nursery and closed the door.

"She'll go to sleep waiting on them," Michonne said. "She might as well sleep right now. We'll talk to her tomorrow."

"I guess I'm going," Rick said with a sigh.

"Check on our watchmen," Daryl said.

Rick nodded. Beau, Libby, and Carl had all volunteered to keep watch near the gates and alert anyone if there was any sign of anything. Daryl knew that all three of them were exhausted, but he hoped that they could keep each other awake enough to make it through the night.

"It's Carl's first night watch," Rick said. "He's not used to going without sleeping this long."

"None of us are," Daryl said. Michonne left them both without a word and slipped into the bedroom. Daryl watched her a second before turning back to Rick. "You're not going to sleep tonight either, are you?" He asked.

Rick shook his head.

"I'm staying up with her," he said. "I don't think she'll sleep until she's sure about what's happening, and I wouldn't want to be awake by myself if I were her. Besides, if something does happen I need to be awake so she doesn't turn."

Daryl clapped him on the shoulder, unsure of what to say. Rick responded by squeezing his shoulder and nodding his head.

"You should try to sleep, though," Rick said. "There's still so much to be done and everyone's going to be looking to you to help them make sure it gets done."

Daryl nodded and watched as Rick descended the stairs without another word. He stood outside the bedroom door until he heard his front close. He slipped into the bedroom, his mind swimming. His side hurt, as did every muscle in his body, and he was slowly being overcome by exhaustion. Michonne was already in bed and he could hear her breathing in the darkness. Apparently they were foregoing bathing for the night and he was too exhausted to care. He stumbled around in the darkness of the room, stripping off his clothes, and finally he collapsed in bed, asleep almost before he hit the pillow.


	103. Chapter 103

Rick put the bucket of hot water down on the floor near where Sadie was sitting, her back against the wall, and tossed a rag at her.

"You heard Mark, you've got to clean yourself up," Rick said. He walked over to the bed and sat down, reaching down to take off his shoes. He was tired and his head throbbed. Once his shoes were off he glanced over at Sadie. She was sitting on the floor in blue jeans. She'd put on a clean shirt from the one she'd been wearing that morning, but there were blood stains on it already from the scratches. She lifted the shirt and started dabbing at the scratches with the rag. Rick sighed and got up, walking over to where she was. He knelt on the floor beside her, reaching out and taking her hand in his to stop the dabbing. "Let me help you," he said when she looked at him.

"I've got it," she said. Rick chuckled.

"You are the most hard headed person that I've ever met in my life," Rick said. "Give it a break, will you? Let me clean the scratches for you."

Sadie sighed and looked at him. He could tell that she was just as exhausted as he was, probably more so. He couldn't imagine what it would be like to spend an entire day feeling like you had a death sentence hanging over your head.

"Fine," she said.

Rick got up and reached his hand out to her. She looked at him questioningly and he gestured again for her to take his hand.

"I'm helping you up. It'll be more comfortable for you to lie on the bed than on the floor, and I can reach you better there," Rick explained.

Sadie nodded and took his hand. He pulled her up and watched as she went to the bed, lying down on top of the cover and tucking her shirt up so that it exposed the claw marks. Rick set to work cleaning them with soap and water. He had brought some rubbing alcohol and bandages that Mark sent with him as well, but he figured the first step was simply trying to get dried blood and mud out of the wounds. Sadie hissed at him, but she didn't fight him, having chosen to put her arms under head to avoid any kind of knee jerk reaction.

"So," Rick said, pausing for a minute to tip her face toward him with the back of his hand. "Are you really not afraid to die, or is that some kind of performance you're enacting for the good of everyone else? We're alone now, you know, there's no one to impress."

Sadie stared at him. He continued to clean at the scratches, glancing every now and again at her as though he wouldn't be able to understand her if he wasn't looking at her, forgetting momentarily that it was a one way street.

"I don't know," Sadie said. "We all die." Rick nodded a little and chuckled at the absurdity of the statement.

"We all die, you're right," he said, "but most people still don't hold it together in the face of it."

"Are you afraid to die?" Sadie asked.

"There you go," Rick said, "always turning things around on me. Why don't you humor me, just this once, and tell me about you?"

Sadie sighed. She hissed again when Rick started the second set of scratches and he apologized to her. The cleaner they were getting, the better they looked, though one or two of them were pretty deep and trying to start bleeding again.

"No, I don't think I'm afraid to die," Sadie said. "I think…" she paused for a minute, "I think that when we die we get to see everyone that we've lost, and even people that we didn't know we'd lost because we never met them. I think that when I die, my grandmother is going to come and get me, and she'll take me to this place. My husband will be there, and my babies, all of them."

Rick heard her voice crack and he focused on her face. A few tears had leaked out the side of her and were running down the side of her face. Rick put the rag down for a minute and dug in his back pocket, offering her handkerchief, which she took and thanked him. She wiped her eyes and nose and then settled back down, flat on the bed again.

"Do you _want_ to die?" Rick asked her.

Sadie shook her head.

"I don't want to die…not anymore…but I'm ready for it when they're ready for me," she said. "If it's tonight, then I will gladly go to them tonight. If it's not, I will wait."

"I don't think it's going to be tonight," Rick said. "I think it was those men that scratched you, not a Walker."

Sadie shrugged a little.

"Maybe so," she said. "Then later it is."

Rick walked away for a minute and came back with the alcohol and bandages that Mark had given him.

"This is going to hurt," he said. Sadie smiled at him.

"I'll pay you back later," she said.

Rick wasn't sure what it was about Sadie that he liked, but he felt like he was beginning to understand her just a little more than he once had, though she was still very much a mystery. He wanted to choke her sometimes, but then other times he just felt frustrated that she kept some kind of invisible wall up. She had a lot of masks, that much he was beginning to realize. He wondered if that had come before all the tragedy of the end of the world, or if it was her way of coping.

"I saw you run at those men," Rick said. "Why did you do that?"

Sadie narrowed her eyes at him. He realized that she had thought that no one had seen it.

"You did that when we moved in on that other group, too. Is that what happened with your old group? Did you throw yourself to them?" Rick asked. He dabbed at the wounds with the alcohol and blew at them when she started to writhe and squirm.

Sadie didn't respond to him until he was done and was bandaging the wounds. She was panting and he felt sorry that he was the one that had to do it. He wondered how Carol and Mark felt being the ones that had to handle everyone's wounds around the community. It wasn't a nice feeling causing someone pain, even if you were trying to help.

"Beth," Sadie said, "Chelsea…they were young. They weren't ready to die. They hadn't even lived yet."

Rick felt sorry for the girls. He'd been trying to put the whole thing out of his mind. It had been easy, perhaps too easy, since they'd been there to put it out of their minds that they were still in the middle of a very dangerous situation. The community felt safe. It felt like they were in a place where nothing could hurt them. Nothing could go wrong here. Yet every death was a reminder that it was all just a game. They were pretending to be safe. They were playing like the dangers weren't lurking. Last night had proved, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that each and every one of them could die at any given moment. The so called safety of their community was no more real than the safety of the prison that the Governor had penetrated more than once.

"And Josh," Sadie said, ignoring the fact that Rick hadn't responded, "he was just a boy. He wasn't much older than Beau, if any."

Rick hadn't known the boy well. In all honesty both Josh and Brenda had remained outside the community to a degree since they'd functioned as primarily nocturnal occupants. The most he really knew about the kid was that he'd lost his brother back at the prison, back when the Governor had made his final appearance. Now it seemed like very little to know about a person.

"There are so many people here," Sadie said, "that are too young to die. I guess it seems like if I could die and save some of them, I might make up for things."

Rick sat down on the bed and Sadie sat up, pulling her shirt down and sitting next to him.

"What are you making up for?" He asked. He knew a lot about feeling like there were things that you needed to make up to people, and he knew a lot about feeling like you could never make them up, but Sadie had never seemed like that type. She had it all together. Every time she'd tried to talk to him about his own situation he'd gotten the feeling that she had hers under control. Suddenly he was beginning to think it might be all an act of sorts.

"You think you let your wife down," Sadie said. "You think you failed her. And that's a hard thing to feel."

Rick stared at her. He knew she'd continue. Sadie took her sweet time saying anything that she wanted to say.

"I know I let my children down," Sadie said. "I was a mother. A mother is supposed to live and die for her children, but my children died, and I'm still here. That's my cross to bear."

"But you couldn't save them," Rick said. She'd recounted the story of her children for him more than once.

Sadie shook her head.

"Doesn't matter. No mother loses her children and doesn't feel like she's failed. I will never get them back, but if I could save someone else…" Sadie let her voice trail off and she shrugged. She sat still for a moment and then offered Rick a half smile. "It doesn't matter," she said.

Rick could tell that was the end of it. She wasn't going to talk about it any further, and it wouldn't matter if he pressed the issue or not. He was grateful that he hadn't lost Carl. He didn't know what it felt like to feel that you'd failed your child. He wasn't prepared for that. For a moment he let his thoughts trail to Judith, and whether or not he'd failed her. She would come to him now and she seemed to like his company just fine, but tonight had proven once again that she did not regard him as a parental figure at all. He had come to accept that, and he wasn't going to change her life dramatically as long as she was happy, but he wondered if he'd failed her by not being what he should have been from the beginning. He wondered if Lori would have thought he failed her, or if she'd have understood that he simply couldn't handle it all back then. He was only barely beginning to feel that he could handle it now.

Sadie didn't say anything, but she got up and crossed the room, making her way back to the floor where she'd been sitting earlier. She sat down and leaned against the wall. Rick watched her for a second and then waved at her, drawing her attention. The lamp was near him, and it was difficult to see her in the darkness across the room.

"Do you want to sleep?" He asked. She didn't respond and he picked up the lamp and made his way over to her, dropping on his knees beside her again. "Do you want to sleep?" He asked again.

Sadie shook her head.

"You can have the bed," Rick said. "I'll stay up if you're worried."

"No," she said. "I'm fine. You can sleep. I'll wake you if I feel sick."

Rick sat back on the floor and put the lamp between them.

"Fine," he said. "If you can be hard headed, so can I. We'll just stare at each other all night, then."

Sadie smiled at him a little and leaned her head back against the wall. He could feel his eyes burning, and her eyelids looked heavy. For whatever reason, though, she didn't want to sleep and he felt like he shouldn't. He really didn't suspect that anything was going to happen, but he knew that it would be foolish to take the chance when he'd agreed to be on guard against the possibility. She was through talking, though, he could see that. He resolved, finally, to sit in silence and wait out the morning with her.

11111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111 11

Tyreese knelt by the bed, having at least had enough of his wits about him to bring a cushion up from downstairs to kneel on. He had his head rested on Carol's legs and was trying not to fall asleep. She'd woke twice, if you could call it waking. Both times she'd moved a little and moaned, but he hadn't seen any real proof that she was cognitive.

Mark had told him that it was for the best that she wasn't awake right now. He'd said it was most likely her body trying to protect her. As long as she stayed out she wasn't moving and hurting herself, and she most likely wasn't fully aware of the pain. Tyreese knew it was his own selfish reasoning for wanting her awake, but he felt like if he could see her fully awake then he could feel like they were out of the woods, like this wasn't something he had to worry about.

He'd been angrier with her earlier. Even though he knew that she wasn't aware of what he was saying or what was happening, he'd scolded her for even going out there. They'd all been out there, but now he was mad that she had been too. Once a wave of anger passed, he'd been swept up into begging. He'd begged her just to wake up for a little bit. He wasn't going to force her to stay awake if she was in pain in the unconscious state kept her away from that. He could understand that, and he'd be willing to let her stay there as long as she needed to deal with it, but he just wanted her awake for a bit. Long enough to reassure him, that was all that he needed.

His mind kept drifting back to Sasha. She'd been all that he'd had left after he'd lost his daughter. Sasha had been the one person that he had to protect. Losing her had been like losing completely the life he'd known before, the person he was. She'd been the last link to the man that he'd been. Carol had helped him through it. She'd calmly and quietly listened to him, no matter how many nights he'd kept her awake talking about it. She'd assured him that he was the same man that he was, and that he hadn't failed Sasha, just as he hadn't failed his daughter.

The only thing that had kept him holding it all together had been his new family, his new life. He'd let himself get caught up, almost, in this new life that he had never imagined would happen. He had Carol, and she was unlike anyone he'd had in his life before. She was gentle and caring and shy. No matter how many times they'd been together, she always blushed at him when he looked at her after sex. He thought it was the funniest thing ever. She thanked him for everything that he did for her, even if it was something small, and acted like he was always doing her the greatest of kindnesses. If nothing else, she made him always feel like he was the best kind of man that he could be.

And then there was Judith. Together they were a family. He and Carol had this funny little girl who looked nothing like either of them, but she was as much theirs as he could imagine. Time and time again he teased Carol about Judith having her personality and her attitude. Carol hated to be told what to do, and Judith did too. She'd already developed the habit of throwing one of her tiny hands on her hip and cocking her head to the side defiantly when they told her what to do, an act that he'd seen from Carol on more than one occasion.

Tyreese felt now, though, that maybe it had all been some kind of fantasy. Here at the end of the world he'd let himself think that he had a new family, one that he'd somehow be able to keep safe, and suddenly he didn't feel so sure about any of that anymore. Mark had urged him to tie Carol's hands to the bed, just in case she slipped out on them as quietly as Seth had. Now she was sleeping, or at least she looked like she was sleeping, and Tyreese didn't know if at any minute she might simply give up. Then what would he be left with? Would he still have Judith? How long could he realistically believe that he could keep Judith safe? How long could he keep her alive? He hadn't been able to protect anyone else that he'd loved. One by one he'd lost them all. Now he was waiting, wondering if he'd lose Carol before the sun even came up.

Tyreese sat up and sighed. He leaned up kissed Carol's cheek. She didn't stir. Underneath the cover she was topless and he pulled them back, examining the bandage that Mark had placed over the wound. There weren't any signs of leaking. That was good. Mark had done a good job at closing the wound. Tyreese kissed her side, gently, and pulled the cover back up over her. It was getting cooler and she was always cold when she slept. He didn't want to leave her uncovered longer than he had to.

"You can sleep a little longer," he said, "but you're going to have to wake up soon. There's so much…" he stopped and took a deep breath. For a moment he felt foolish again, talking to her when he doubted she could hear him. He talked to her, though, because it made him feel better. It reminded him that she wasn't gone, at least not yet. Her breathing may be a lot shallower than it normally was, but she was still breathing. "There's so much to do around here," he said. "There's even more now. You're going to have to wake up because now isn't the time for sleeping."

Tyreese rubbed the side of her face, cupping her cheek a moment in his hand. He wished her arms didn't have to be tied above her head like they were. He knew that if she woke up, whenever she finally did, her shoulders were going to be sore from the position. He ran his hands down one of her arms.

"I'll untie them in the morning," he said. "You can sleep until then and I'll keep watch, but you need to go ahead and start thinking about waking up. Judith hasn't seen you all day either. She's going to be anxious to see you tomorrow, and you don't want her to see you like this. It might scare her."

Tyreese sat there a little longer, talking at intervals and simply watching at others. He didn't know what else to do. He couldn't let himself go to sleep simply because he felt like if he closed his eyes and slept that she'd slip away from him. Somehow his being awake and watching her was keeping her there. He just had to keep her there a little longer until she was able to stay with him without needing him to keep watch.

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Glenn felt completely helpless and unarmed for the situation that he was facing. Maggie had been crying most of the day. It hadn't been the kind of cry that they'd gotten used to these days either. These days it seemed that when someone cried it was an almost silent cry. It was one in which tears rolled down their face and sometimes their noses ran. It was a private cry, something they almost seemed to want to keep to themselves. Sometimes, when it got really bad, there would be sobs or hiccupping gasps from the person that was crying, but even then it was somewhat understood that the crying was meant for personal use and not really one that was willingly being shared with others.

That had not been the way that Maggie was crying. Maggie was crying with the same nature that Judith or Hope used when they cried about something that upset them. It was a full cry, the kind that let you know that whatever had caused it had destroyed their entire world. It was a cry that made it sound as though all the happiness had been sucked out of them by some kind of giant vacuum. That was the kind of cry that Maggie had sunk into.

The entire time that Maggie had cried, she had attempted to speak. Glenn had understood, at best, a word here or there through the screaming wails. He hadn't needed to understand the words though, they really didn't mean anything. The sound itself had told him everything. She was crying because her sister was dead. She was also crying, it seemed, because her father was dead. Her mother was dead. Her brothers were dead. She seemed to be trying to cry for the entire world of the dead. She had enough sorrow and tears inside for everyone that had gone before her, and she had almost choked on them, pouring them out all over herself and all over Glenn.

He hadn't known what to do to help her. He hadn't known what to say. His family was gone too. Most of the people around him were in the same boat. They were without anyone that had known them before. Whether all at once or one at a time, life had wiped their loved ones out of their lives. Maggie was just now being bulldozed with that reality.

As she cried, he had prayed that the crying would stop, even though he wasn't someone who regularly practiced praying for things. He wanted her to have some comfort, some kind of rest, and it was clear to him that he couldn't offer it to her. He didn't possess the power to take away even an ounce of the pain that she was feeling, and he felt like she looked at him like she was angry with him for his complete uselessness in the situation.

Now, though, the crying had stopped. It stopped suddenly. It had literally been like she'd simply run out. She'd run out of tears, perhaps. One moment she'd been howling in sorrow and the next she'd been completely quiet. And that was how she remained now, quiet. She sat in the bed next to him, hugging her knees up at her chest, her chin resting on them. She stared out across the room in the dim light. She wasn't staring at anything, but she was looking at the nothing as intensely as she could.

Glenn had tried to talk to her, but he didn't know the words that he should say. He didn't know what she needed from him. She wouldn't look at him, and when he touched her she let him, but she didn't return the touch. Now he sat beside her, not knowing what to say or do.

When Maggie had reached her, Beth was already gone. From the looks of the chest wound, Glenn doubted that Beth had lived even more than a few moments after she'd been hit. He'd insisted that Maggie let him handle the situation, not wanting her to have to be the one to put a bullet through the brain of her sister, but Maggie had looked as though she might kill him if he dared to try to stop her. She'd been the one to do it, and then she'd only allowed him to touch Beth enough to move her inside so that she could carefully bathe her and dress her to be buried.

Glenn couldn't believe that Beth was gone. It didn't seem real. Nothing right now seemed real. Not even Maggie seemed real to him. He felt almost dizzy from exhaustion, but he was wide awake on the other hand. Just a few days ago he and Maggie had been talking about their future. She'd even mentioned that if they stayed there, they might want to consider starting a family. The community was safe. They were safe. They'd lost loved ones along the way, but now it seemed that those days were far less frequent. There were accidents, from time to time, but the overwhelming danger that had hung over them before was a memory now.

And now Beth was dead. There were others dead too, but Glenn honestly hadn't paid enough attention to know who was missing or who was injured. He'd been entirely consumed by losing Beth. He'd been consumed by worrying about Maggie and how he could take care of her knowing now that their safety was just an illusion. They weren't safe at all. Somehow a herd of Walkers had invaded their safety. People had shot them, had killed Beth, and all in the very same place that they thought they were safe.

Now Maggie seemed like a hollow version of herself. Someone that Glenn wasn't sure how to help. He was on the outside of her now. All he could do was sit next to her, knowing that he loved her with all of his heart and soul, and hope that she could somehow eventually crawl out of her grief enough to realize that. He didn't know what to do, or even if there was anything to do, and it was the worst feeling that he'd had in quite some time. He felt alone and useless, and that made him angry, though he couldn't quite figure out who it was that he was angry with.

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Daryl woke a little when something didn't feel right. He swam just outside consciousness and tried to figure out what it was that was disturbing his sleep. Slowly the memory of the night before crept in on him and he realized that the nightmares that he'd been battling were less nightmares and more memories. He willed himself awake and listened, but around him there was nothing but silence. There were no alarms, no screaming, no moans and groans of Walkers, and no gunfire. He couldn't even hear any of the babies crying, but something had woken him up.

Daryl lie back down and put his arm around Michonne again, fitting his body against hers like he often did while he slept. As he closed his eyes and started to drift off again, he felt a tremor run through her body and pass into his. For a moment he ignored it, thinking that perhaps he had moved and let a wave of the chilly bedroom air pass under the cover. Then there was another tremor. He listened and realized that her breath didn't sound like it normally did while she was sleeping.

"'Chonne, you awake?" Daryl asked. He started to sit up, his hand moving to rest on her arm. She trembled again, but didn't respond to him. He shook her gently. "'Chonne?"

Michonne mumbled something, but it was unintelligible. Daryl got out of bed and fumbled around in the darkness trying to find the lamp and light it. When he finally succeeded, he moved in front of Michonne and sat on the edge of the bed. Her eyes were open, but she wasn't looking at him.

"You shakin', 'Chonne, what's wrong? You cold?" He asked. Michonne didn't look at him. Daryl started to feel his heart clench. He didn't know what was wrong with her, but something was wrong with her. "Answer me, 'Chonne, you alright?" He asked, a little more force behind his words.

Michonne rolled her eyes to look at him, but she didn't answer him. He felt the tremor again. He got up then and pulled on a pair of shorts. He went directly down the stairs and found Mark asleep on their couch, just as he said he'd be. Daryl shook his shoulder.

Mark rolled over. He'd obviously been asleep, but it hadn't been a profound sleep.

"What's wrong?" He asked. "Is it Carol? Sadie?"

"No," Daryl said. "It's Michonne."

Mark sat up a little. Daryl could barely make him out in the dark.

"What's wrong with her?" He asked.

"I don't know," Daryl said. "That's why I come to get you. She's shakin' an' she ain't talkin' at all."

Mark got up then and followed Daryl upstairs. When they came in the room they found Michonne just as Daryl had left her. Daryl stood to the side and watched. Mark went and sat in front of her. He tried talking to her and asking her some questions, but Michonne didn't respond to her any more than she'd responded to Daryl.

"Shock," Mark said after a minute. Daryl watched as the man massaged his temples. He sighed. "I'm not surprised. She won't be the last either, you can bet your bottom dollar on that. It's all just too much right now."

"What do we do?" Daryl asked.

"Right now?" Mark asked. "Get another blanket. Keep her warm. Comfort her, talk to her. Do whatever you would normally do to calm her down. It's psychological shock. She's not suffering from any physical illness right now, she's just emotionally overwhelmed. Keep trying to calm her down, but be prepared. When she finally let's go she's likely to be pretty emotional, and that's what you want."

"Ya mean she's gonna cry or somethin'?" Daryl asked.

"I hope so," Mark said. "I'm not a psychiatrist, but I know that the dam has to break. I'm sure we're going to see a lot of this. This has got everyone shook up and we're all going to have to deal with it in our own ways."

Mark got up and Daryl went to the closet, coming back with another blanket.

"Ya sure she's alright?" Daryl asked.

"I'm pretty sure she's alright, but you do need to try to get her to let it out. Stress can be hard on pregnant women, and I really don't want to deal with that baby trying to come early on top of everything else. It still needs to bake at least another month and a half. I don't know if I could do much more it if it came right now," Mark said. He squeezed Daryl's arm. Daryl nodded at him and started to put the blanket over Michonne.

"Looks like it's gonna be a long night," Daryl said.

"Something tells me that we haven't seen the last one of those," Mark said. He started out of the room and Daryl got back in bed. The extra weight of the second blanket bearing down on him. He started rubbing Michonne's arm and circled down, rubbing her belly, creating an unbroken circle.

"Calm down, 'Chonne," Daryl said, leaning in close to her ear. "It's all gonna be alright," he said. He didn't know what he was supposed to say to get her to calm down. He felt like right now he didn't have any certainty behind anything that he said. He almost felt as though he were lying to her just like she'd lied to Judith. Still, he had to say whatever he could to get her to relax. "If ya wanna cry, 'Chonne, ya can cry. I ain't gon' tell no one if ya don't want me too, but'cha gotta calm down. Ain't good for ya to be upset and it ain't good for the baby."

Daryl fought to stay awake. He continued rubbing, stopping every now and again to squeeze at Michonne's neck muscles, and he tried to say anything soothing and reassuring that he could think of. What he really wanted to say was that he needed her just as much as she needed him right now. He needed her to cry or scream or whatever it was that she needed to do and he needed her to be alright. There was so much that he felt like he had to be responsible for right now, so much that everyone seemed to want from him, and he was certain that the only way he could give them even half of what they needed was if she was with him.

Daryl felt a little guilty at the thought. Maybe she thought he needed her to be strong, even when she didn't feel like it. Maybe that's what had her dammed up now. He felt guilty to think he might be the cause of it. He didn't need her to be strong, he could understand if she wanted to cry. He just needed her to be alright. He needed to know that she was crying, and eventually the crying would pass, but she would be alright.

He didn't know how long he stayed there, rubbing her, holding her, talking to her, but eventually the trembling stopped. Not long after it stopped, he realized that she'd gone to sleep. He didn't know if that was it. He didn't know if that was all she needed, or if she'd wake up again exactly the same way she'd been before. There hadn't been tears, and she had never said anything. There was a lot that Daryl felt like he didn't know right now, but he did know that she was asleep, and he could only hope that she stayed that way until morning and that maybe she woke up feeling a little better about everything they still had to face with the rising sun.


	104. Chapter 104

**AN: Again, we're still dealing with aftermath, and we will be for a while. I'd like to thank you for your support of the story. As I mentioned before, I'm sure that I won't address everything in the fallout chapters that I should, but I'm going to be doing my best. There's really a good deal here to deal with. We're going to be seeing a little more character development here and we're getting ready to move into some more plot development as the community begins to pull together after what's happened. **

**I hope you enjoy! **

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When Michonne woke up her back was screaming at her. She wrestled herself up into a sitting position and sat on the side of the bed a moment. She'd been asleep, but she didn't feel like she'd really slept. She started to turn, knowing that Daryl's side of the bed was empty, but her neck and shoulders ached. She'd spent too long in this position, too long in the bed.

She got up, still half dressed in what she'd worn the day before. She was going to have to go outside. She could hear the children howling, and it was clear that no one was taking care of the situation. She stumbled around the room, attempting to get dressed. She felt nauseous and hungry all at the same time and as she struggled into her pants she fought the urge to give up. Right now getting dressed really seemed like much more of a hassle than it was worth.

Michonne sat down on the bed halfway into her pants and tried to steady her breathing. Her head was pounding now to go with the rest of the aches and pains and she could still hear the wailing of the children that were shut in the nursery. She didn't know what time it was or how long she'd been sleeping past when she should have gotten up. She'd never heard Daryl get up, and usually she at least woke a little when he got up and got dressed.

Michonne pulled herself together and finished getting dressed. She made her way toward the nursery and took a deep breath before opening the door. Judith was the first that she noticed. She was no longer contained by her crib, so right now she was standing, leaning against the wall and knocking at it with one hand while she squeezed her duck in the other. She was squalling so much that she gagged at intervals. Hope was standing in her crib, holding onto the rail, and screaming with almost the same intensity as Judith. Paul was in the other crib writhing and howling.

Michonne pushed her way into the door, pushing Judith back when she tried to escape. She closed the door behind her. Judith grabbed onto her leg, wailing and requesting Carol over and over. Michonne didn't know what to do with her, so she picked her up and put her in the crib with Hope where the child had what appeared to be a tiny nervous breakdown.

Michonne turned to Paul. He was an easy baby to please. She could change him and feed him and at least be down one set of lungs protesting the situation. She collected him out of the crib and took him to the changing table. He didn't give up the fight the entire time she changed him, and he continued to wail while she was refastening his clothes. That, coupled with the screaming behind her from Hope's crib, was making her feel like screaming.

When she'd had both her girls, and it had simply been her responsible for everything in their lives, she'd walk away at times like this. She'd just put them in their cribs, leave the room for about ten minutes, and then she'd be able to handle it better. She didn't feel like she could leave all three of them any longer, though.

Michonne felt herself being overwhelmed. She wanted to cry right along with them, just like Judith, until she finally threw up and maybe then at least the nausea would pass. She picked the crying baby up and carried him over to the rocking chair. She sat down and pulled up her shirt, offering him a breast. At least for a moment one set of cries was hushed.

How many had they lost? Three? Four? She wasn't positive, but she thought that it had been four funerals they had the day before. Four people lost in one day. She had no idea how many were injured. She hadn't even asked how many were injured. And how many had they lost during the night? Sadie was likely dead. Was Carol dead? Who else was dead?

Michonne tried to drown out the sound of the girls with the thoughts in her head. What was she doing trapped in a room full of screaming children? How did this even happen? Judith wasn't her child. If Carol was dead, who did Judith belong to? Did she belong to Tyreese? Rick? And what about Paul? If Sadie was dead would Mark really take the baby?

When she'd lost her girls she had simply closed that chapter in her life. This wasn't a world for children. This wasn't even a world for adults. It was just a world of tragedy and cruel death, and somehow she had ended up pregnant with Hope and she'd accepted it. When Hope was coming, that was just it. There had been nothing to be done about it. She'd been an accident, but accident or not, she was coming. Somehow, somewhere along the way, she'd fooled herself into believing that she and Daryl would keep Hope safe. They'd build some kind of life for her and she'd be safe. They could do that. Michonne looked at her belly and another stream of nausea hit her. How had she let this happen? How had she been stupid enough to believe that anyone was safe? There wasn't any such thing as a safe place anymore, and she'd gone and done this? Losing two children hadn't been enough? She'd brought Hope into this world, and now she had what? Six weeks? Eight weeks? She was bringing _another_ child into this world?

A knock at the door caught Michonne's attention and snatched her back into the reality around her. Paul was done eating and beginning to squirm. Hope had stopped wailing and was on her hands and knees in the crib, her face pressed against the bars, watching Michonne. Judith was still crying, probably thoroughly confused about her life.

Daryl opened the door a crack and stuck his head in. Michonne realized she was crying, she could feel the tears rolling down her cheeks and she didn't feel like she even knew what to do with the baby in her arms that probably thought he was going to blow up soon if she didn't move him to burp him.

"Ya OK, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked as he pushed into the nursery.

Michonne tried to think how many times she'd heard that question. How many times had she reassured Daryl that she was OK about one thing or another?

"I've done some really stupid things in my life," she said finally. Daryl looked at her, confused. He hesitated a moment near the door and then stepped further inside, lifting Judith out of the crib to try and calm her down.

"What'cha talkin' 'bout, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked.

"I think this is it, though," Michonne said, somewhat ignoring him. "This is the stupidest thing I've ever done."

"What is, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked. He turned his attention for a second to Judith. "Jude, ya gotta be quiet. We gonna feed ya an' I promise ya that ya gonna see ya parents, but ya gotta be quiet 'cause ya gonna make yourself sick."

Michonne watched him a minute and sighed, waking up a little from the stupor of her thoughts. She burped the baby she was holding, really not caring that he repaid her for her slowness by spitting up probably half of what he'd eaten down her chest. She chuckled at it a little. It was the end of the world. People died by the handful without warning. They were murdered by madmen, torn apart by drooling freaks…and here she was, covered in baby vomit.

"This is, Daryl. This whole thing. You, me, Hope…I'm supposed to have another baby, Daryl. What was I thinking? You could have been killed yesterday. People are dying like flies, Daryl, and I'm supposed to have a baby? This is the stupidest thing that I've ever done," Michonne said.

Daryl looked at her wide eyed, but he didn't respond immediately. He looked tired. His eyes were dark and Michonne wondered if he'd slept at all. His mouth fell open a little bit.

"OK, 'Chonne, I need ya to listen to me. Glenn, he ain't doin' so hot right now. We tryin' to keep him from killin' them guys we found that we think done this so we might can get 'em to talk to us. Maggie, she's havin' some sorta breakdown or somethin', that's what Mark said. I ain't even seen Rick today an' I don't know if Sadie's alive or dead. Tyreese ain't holdin' it all together real good, and I just need to know if ya havin' some kinda issue like they is, 'cause if ya is, that's OK, but I don't really know what to do about it right now," Daryl said.

Michonne looked at Daryl. As terrible as she felt right this minute, she felt sorry for him. She'd never seen him look like he did right this second. They had been hit before. The Governor had attacked them at the prison. He'd threatened the lives of all of them. Then, though, they'd known he was coming. They'd always known that the threat was real. It was something they kept tucked in the back of their minds the whole time. They'd let that threat go here, though. They'd taken out another group before it could threaten them. They'd built a life inside the fences of this community and for a moment they'd all believed they may have been invincible, and now they knew they weren't. They were anything but invincible.

Daryl's face clearly showed that he was no longer under any impression that they were safe, but he was looking at her like he needed something from her, and she didn't know what he needed and she didn't know that she had it to give.

"What are we going to do?" She asked, hearing her own voice break.

Daryl put Judith on the floor and came over to where Michonne was. He took the baby out of her arms and put him the crib that she'd gotten him out of earlier. Daryl leaned down in front of her.

"We gon' do what we been doin', 'Chonne. We gon' keep on going. We ain't broke," Daryl said. "We gon' find out who done this and they gonna pay for it and that's it. We ain't gonna lose everything we worked for and we sure ain't gonna give up and roll over."

"First it was the Governor, and now it's some people we don't even know, Daryl. There's always going to be someone out there trying to kill us," Michonne said.

"Hell, 'Chonne, they always been crazy people in the world and I reckon there's even more of 'em now. We got each other, though, and we got the group. We can't just give up. We got Hope, and we gonna have this baby, so we gotta keep on going for them. We ain't got time to just go crazy 'bout the fact that somethin' might happen," Daryl said. "Things look real bad right now, and they've looked real bad before, but they gonna look better."

Michonne knew he was right, but it was hard to imagine at this moment that she was going to go back to feeling like she had a few days ago, back to thinking that they might actually have some kind of life ahead of them. She nodded at him, though, realizing that they didn't have any other choice. They did have Hope, and Hope needed them. This baby was coming, whether she was ready for it or not, and there wasn't any changing that.

"You're right," she said. She wasn't wholly convinced, but she knew that sitting here feeling sorry for herself wasn't going to solve anything. There were things that had to be done, and they had to keep doing them as long as they were alive.

"Rachel and Libby, they done made breakfast. Let's go get somethin' to eat, OK?" Daryl said. "If ya feel up to it they gonna fix up another house, make us another headquarters. We almost got all the Walkers cleaned up now. We're gonna get things back as normal as we can and we're gonna make sure that whoever did this pays for it. I need you, though, 'Chonne, and Hope needs ya. If ya wanta cry, then go ahead and do it 'til ya feel better, but we gotta pull this group back together."

Michonne nodded again and reached her hands out to Daryl. He stood up and pulled her up. She went and plucked Paul back out of the crib. He was patiently waiting on her. Daryl didn't wait for her to ask, he gathered Hope up and took Judith's hand, leading her out of the nursery.

Michonne hoped that Daryl was right and that they could pull things back together. She didn't know who had done this, or why they had done it, but she hoped that they paid for it, and she hoped that somehow they could avoid things like this happening again.

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Rick woke up mainly because his left arm was killing him. It was completely dead on the one hand, but even though it was dead he was strangely aware of it being painful. He shifted a little, finally dragging it out from under him with his right arm. He opened his eyes and realized he was asleep on the floor, and then he realized he felt far too old to be sleeping on the floor.

Rick put his right arm down on his side before really opening his eyes. His arm touched something that he knew didn't belong to him and he opened his eyes then, blinking. He was staring directly into Sadie's stomach, and one of her legs was draped over him and draped over his waist. He sat up a little. For as bad as he felt, she was going to feel way worse.

Apparently their plan to stay up all night had not included the fact that neither of them was as young as they used to be and neither of them was spry enough to actually just sit on the floor and stay awake for an entire night, especially after the draining day they'd had before. Sadie had apparently fallen asleep against the wall and slid down it during the night. The result was that she was almost entirely on the floor with one shoulder and her head still slumped against the wall. Rick didn't remember falling asleep, but he was curled up beside her, and she'd wrapped her leg over him at some point.

The skin on her stomach was exposed, her sliding having obviously pulled her shirt up as she went. Rick reached and gently touched the skin there. It was cool from the bedroom air. There wasn't any fever and at least twenty four hours had passed. She wasn't Walker scratched. He thought to himself that it was a good thing too. If she'd turned during the night he would have most definitely been eaten because he'd failed at being a guard.

Rick left his fingers where they were a second, on the soft skin of her stomach. He turned back to look at her and was surprised that she was staring back at him now.

"No fever," he said. She nodded slightly and he became aware that he still had his hand on her. He moved it. "Sorry," he said. She didn't say anything.

Rick pulled himself up and slowly she shifted too, apologizing as she unwrapped her leg from around his body.

"I guess they shouldn't leave us on night watch together," Rick said, when they were both in the sitting position on the floor. Sadie rubbed at her neck.

"No, they shouldn't," she responded.

Rick didn't know what made him do it, but he leaned into her then and kissed her on the lips. He half expected her to pull away, but she didn't. She didn't exactly return the kiss, but she didn't stop him either. He pulled away, embarrassed that he'd done it. She just stared at him, though, not responding in any way.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I don't know why I did that."

"I do," she said, "and it's OK." She sat there another minute and then started to get up. "I have to go and get Paul."

Rick nodded and pulled himself to his feet, ignoring the protests of his muscles. She was up before him, but he found his footing not long after.

"I guess I need to go and see what Daryl might need help with," Rick said.

"Thank you," Sadie said.

Rick felt like he didn't know quite how to respond to her thanks in the moment. He'd really done nothing more than stay the night with her. Nothing had happened. There hadn't been any sort of tragedy, even though they'd prepared themselves for one.

"You're welcome," he said after a second, not entirely convinced of his own words. Sadie surprised him, then by leaning up and pulling his head toward her. It was her, this time, that planted a kiss on his lips. He returned it, a little sorry when she broke away. As soon as she broke away, Sadie turned and started out of the bedroom. Rick stood there a moment, getting his bearings about him, and then he followed after her. He wasn't sure if they were going to talk about it, or if it meant anything, it could have simply been one of those things that people do when everything around them seems to be going crazy.

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Tyreese took his breakfast plate back to the bedroom where he'd been holding vigil over Carol. He sat down on the edge of the bed and started to eat, though he wasn't very hungry. Outside Michonne had been helping to hand out plates and Emma, Libby's little sister, had been watching the children. He'd had to nearly fight Judith to get her to let him go once she'd spotted him, but he'd finally convinced her that playing with the others was far more entertaining than clinging to him.

His daughter had been young when his wife had passed away and he knew that children had a difficult time with things like death. He didn't know if Judith was old enough to understand it, or how she might process it, but he didn't want to bring her into the room with Carol right now. Even the concept of "she's sleeping" could be hard to explain since she clearly wouldn't wake up as easily as she normally did when Judith simply pounced on her some mornings, giggling, because Tyreese had found her up before Carol.

Mark had been in there earlier. He'd said she was doing better. He'd said that her breathing sounded better and that he was optimistic about things. Those had been his words, but that hadn't been his facial expression, though Tyreese wasn't entirely sure if that was owing to the way that Mark felt about Carol or simply the way he felt about the entire situation.

Tyreese ate about as much of his breakfast as he could choke down. It wasn't appetizing and he simply didn't want it. He put the plate on the bedside table. There was a knock on the door and he called for whoever it was to come in. The door opened and Mark slipped inside.

"How is she?" Mark asked. "Any change?"

"None," Tyreese said. He slid over on the edge of the bed and reached up, untying her arms and bringing them down to rest at her sides. He only kept them tied when he had to leave or when he feared he was going to fall asleep, and right now neither was the case. He rubbed one of her arms between his hands, figuring that the circulation in them might not be the best from leaving her in that position.

Mark loomed over him a moment.

"I don't know if you heard, but Sadie's fine," Mark said. "The scratches were apparently human."

Tyreese nodded. He'd seen the woman downstairs talking to Michonne and figured that she was fine. If she wasn't it was taking her far longer to die from Walker attack than anyone he'd seen so far.

"Good for her," Tyreese said. Immediately he regretted saying it. He had nothing against the woman. In fact, she'd never been anything but kind to him and he knew that Carol was very fond of her. They belonged, it seemed at times, to some kind of club. The mothers who'd lost their children club or something to the like. That's what he always figured drew them together. Michonne was the same way. Carol talked about it sometimes, like they had some special way of understanding one another. He knew, though, that losing a child changed you, so he could only imagine that it might be even more dramatic for mothers. "I didn't mean that," Tyreese said after a moment. "I really am glad that she's OK."

"I get it," Mark said. "We all worry about our people, first and foremost. I brought something for Carol," Mark said. He held out his hand, showing Tyreese that he'd brought some kind of medicine in a syringe. "Pretty decent pain med," he said. "I have a theory that if we get the pain eased off some, she's going to come to."

"You really think it'll work?" Tyreese asked.

"Worth a try, right?" Mark said. "I do think it'll work. It might take a little bit for it to get into her blood stream, but I think she's likely to respond at least a little."

"What do you want me to do?" Tyreese asked.

"Just help me ease her over some so I can inject it. Be careful, though, we don't want to hurt her worse," Mark said.

Tyreese did as Mark instructed, crawling beside Carol and easing her body against his, as careful as he could be with her. When Mark had injected the medicine, he eased her back down into the position she was in before.

"Now what?" Tyreese asked.

"We wait," Mark said.

"I'm getting good at that," Tyreese said.

Mark hovered over him a moment longer.

"I don't have any other patients now," Mark said. "If you want to go and get some air, I can stay with her."

Tyreese shook his head.

"I'm not going to leave her. What if she wakes up and she just thinks that I didn't care enough to stay?" He asked.

"I wouldn't let her think that," Mark said. "You've been cooped up in here, though, and you haven't slept. At least go take a little walk and get your blood pumping. Go and see Judith. I'll stay with her. I promise that if she wakes up I'll come for you immediately."

Tyreese was reluctant to go, but finally he agreed. He decided he'd get Judith and maybe walk around with her a few minutes. The girl was obviously missing both of them, and he could at least give her a few minutes of attention. He stood up and took his plate from the nightstand.

"I'm not going far, I'll just be in the street outside," he said.

"I promise," Mark said. "I'll come and get you if anything changes."

Tyreese nodded at him and started outside.

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"Daryl!" Jimmy called, coming toward Daryl with Glenn a few steps behind him. Daryl was busy helping Beau move some of the final Walkers to one of the fires. "Them men are dead, we put 'em down."

Daryl helped Beau heave the body that they had onto the fire and then he wiped his hands on his pants and turned toward Glenn and Jimmy.

"How'd they die?" Daryl asked. He knew that Glenn had been anxious to kill them, as though that would help Maggie through what she was going through. Mark had been down to check on her and essentially declared her as suffering from shock, like he'd said about Michonne the night before, but Maggie's seemed to be different.

Michonne was holding herself together right now. She was quiet, that much was true, but she was helping to get a place set up for headquarters. Maggie had seemed to check out completely. Stella was sitting with her on the porch to the house she and Glenn lived in, but there was no evidence that Maggie was aware of anything around her. It had gotten to Glenn, and he'd seemed to decide that if he could kill the men that they suspected had orchestrated the attack, then he'd at least feel better.

Jimmy shrugged at Daryl's question.

"They just died, man, like they quit breathing," he said.

Daryl didn't push the boy too much. He was just as tired as everyone else and it was painted on his face. The fact that he'd been down there keeping Glenn from killing them was enough. Daryl couldn't hide, though, his disappointment at the fact that they weren't going to be able to question the men.

"Do ya think they was the only ones?" Daryl asked Jimmy. He really didn't expect the boy to answer. It wasn't a sincere question that he was expecting anyone to have an answer to. It was more something he'd been asking himself. No one had showed up since the attack. Beau, Libby, and Carl had kept watch all night and had reported nothing more than a small herd of Walkers that passed by at some point. It appeared that if the men had a group, the group either didn't know where they were or wasn't coming for them.

Jimmy shrugged again.

"They mighta been," he said. "If they were alone, though, there ain't no one left."

Daryl nodded his head.

"Where are they now?" He asked.

"Still where we left 'em," Jimmy said.

"We want to get a wheelbarrow and burn the assholes," Glenn spat.

Daryl shrugged.

"Go ahead. They aren't any good to us now, and we're sure as shit not digging holes to bury them," Daryl said.

"How's Maggie?" Glenn asked. Daryl saw him glance in the direction of the porch. He shrugged again.

"She ain't come off the porch since ya left," Daryl said. Glenn sighed and nodded his head in response. "I'm sure she's gonna be alright," Daryl said. "She's gonna come around. 'Chonne keeps goin' through some kinda spells. I reckon Maggie's is just worse." He didn't really know what to say to Glenn to make him feel better.

"Michonne didn't lose her sister," Glenn said. "I guess Maggie's is a lot worse."

Daryl nodded his head and clasped Glenn briefly on the shoulder. He wasn't going to take to heart anything that the boy said right now. None of them could really take to heart anything that anyone said or did. Everyone was still trying to figure out how to process everything that was going on, and Daryl supposed that meant they were all going to hit a lot of bumps in the road.

"We're going to burn those bodies now," Glenn said. Daryl nodded at him and watched as he turned and walked off with Jimmy sleepily walking by his side.


	105. Chapter 105

**AN: I'd like to preface this chapter by saying that I'm not 100% satisfied with it, but I've been messing with it for a bit and it is what it is. If I were a professional and this were my livelihood and not simply a pastime, I would spend more time ironing out the details and filing away the rough edges. That is not the case, though, so I've decided that this will simply be a chapter that's not my favorite of all the ones that I've written. **

**From here we'll be moving on and exploring more aspects of our story. I hope you enjoy it and again I apologize that it is not the stellar chapter I would like for it to be, but I really feel that I had to just let it go out there into the universe so that I could get past a few of these small hurdles and continue moving forward instead of simply staying put because I wasn't quite thrilled with this one little section. **

**I hope it's not too bad.**

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The new house for headquarters, much like any of the other houses in the community, looked the same as the old one, except for the fact that the furniture was different, and of course the location had changed. Daryl sat at the new table that had been moved in and ate his dinner in silence with the rest of the group members gathered there.

In the past couple of days since the attack, Daryl had noticed a marked change fall over the community. The jovial attitudes and the lightness that had once been a part of every gathering was missing. Everyone seemed to be holding their breath, waiting for the next shoe to fall, waiting for the next piece in the puzzle of destruction.

They had cleaned up the Walkers and physically everything in the community had been returned to normal, except of course the scorched ground and burnt remains of what had once been their headquarters. They hadn't quite gotten that cleaned up and it stood as a sort of monument to their false security. Nothing was safe and nothing was sacred.

Grieving was taking place, this time, in conjunction with work. Everyone had been busy trying to restore order, trying to figure out what needed to be done. There hadn't been time for anyone to wallow, really in their sadness, except for Maggie. She had secluded herself, pulling away from everyone. She only allowed Glenn into her presence, and from time to time Stella or Junior. Daryl hoped that in time she would over the shock of losing Beth, but he wasn't going to even pretend that he thought it would be something that would happen quickly.

Earlier that day, Carol had been awake for a few minutes, and Tyreese looked markedly less heavy. He was eating with group while Mark stayed with her. No one but Mark and Tyreese had been in to see her yet, but Daryl was glad to hear that she had at least been awake and responding. Judith was pleased too, since it meant that Tyreese had come out of hiding. She was sitting in his lap now, eating dinner with him, and looking as though she might fall asleep simply on the principle of having him put her to bed.

Daryl knew that now that they'd had a couple of days to try to get their community back in order, they had to address the situation. They had to figure out who had attacked them and why, and they needed some kind of plan. He hadn't pressed the issue yet, but he also didn't want to wait too long to bring it up. It needed to be addressed before they were attacked again. As he looked around the table, he decided that he would wait until morning. Maybe everyone, knowing that much of the work was done, would go home and actually rest. Perhaps the next day would bring them all about and they'd be able to throw out ideas about what should actually be done.

Daryl knew that he, for one, would welcome a little rest. His body was tired from the day's work and his mind was exhausted from turning scenarios over and over. He glanced at Michonne and could tell that she was much the same. She was eating, but not with any enthusiasm, and she looked exhausted every time that Hope so much as reached for her from the seat next to her.

1111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111

"Can I do somethin' for ya?" Daryl asked Michonne when he finally realized that he was never going to get to fall asleep.

"What?" Michonne asked. "I thought you were asleep."

"I was tryin' to be, 'Chonne, but you 'bout got me sea sick from all that floppin' around ya been doin'," Daryl said.

"I can't help it," Michonne said. "The baby won't get still at all tonight."

Daryl sat up and put his hand over her belly, feeling the baby move under it. He leaned over Michonne's back and rested his head against her.

"OK, kid, ya gotta go to sleep now or ya Mama's gonnna be ill as a snake tomorrow and don't none of us want to deal with that," Daryl said. Michonne snickered at him. "I know you're probably excited 'cause there's been a lot going on around here, but right now ain't the time to be dancin' around. You gonna have plenty of time for that tomorrow."

Daryl lie back down and rested his hand on Michonne's belly, rubbing circles on it, snuggling against the wall of pillows that she'd built up. He knew the baby wasn't going to just go to sleep because he asked it to, but he hoped that if he could get Michonne to relax, which he knew she hadn't much in the past few days, he might be able to get her to go to sleep and then they wouldn't both be miserable.

"Just try to relax, 'Chonne, baby might go to sleep if you do," Daryl said.

"I'm sorry I didn't think of that," Michonne said. Daryl chuckled a little.

"OK, you got me there, but you need to sleep an' so do I," Daryl responded.

Michonne was still for a few minutes and Daryl continued rubbing circles, trying to either successfully soothe his wife or his child, at this point not caring which the first to succumb was.

"Daryl, do you think we're going to figure out who attacked us?" Michonne asked after a moment.

"I don't know, 'Chonne, but we're gonna do our best," Daryl said.

"Do you think that those men were alone, or are we just waiting for more of them to come?" Michonne asked.

Daryl knew that Michonne didn't really believe that he had any sort of answer for her questions. She was simply asking them to pass the time until she managed to fall asleep.

"Don't know that neither," Daryl said. "If they weren't the only ones, though, then we're gonna find the group they was with before they come back. Tomorrow I'm gonna try to get everyone together. See if we can't come up with some kind of plan. We ain't gonna spend all winter worryin' 'bout some other group that didn't have the foresight to prepare like we did."

Daryl felt Michonne rest her hand over his. It stilled the circles he was tracing, but he also felt her relax a little. He hoped he wasn't lying to her and that they were able to figure out what to do to keep their community from suffering any more than it had.

1111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111

"We know that realistically it wasn't just three men that attacked us," Rick said. "They knew enough to cut the chains on our gates and they had to be watching enough to know when Josh and Brenda were making rounds instead of sitting in waiting to stop them. This wasn't a spur of the moment attack. This was something that they planned."

"So what'cha think we oughta do?" Daryl asked Rick.

Everyone who wanted to be present had been invited to come to the new headquarters and join in on a discussion about how to proceed with the possible threat of other groups in the area. The turnout hadn't been quite what Daryl had expected, but the group was going through a lot.

Maggie had denied the invitation, choosing rather to stay with Brenda. Tyreese had stayed with Carol who swam in and out of consciousness. Jimmy was keeping a tight watch near the gates, suspecting that if whoever attacked them was to return, they would likely try to achieve access the same way they had before. The rest of the parameter being much harder to breach. Rachel had excused herself from the meeting by declaring that she would rather keep busy trying to stay on top of the day to day tasks that were overwhelming them without Carol keeping everything organized and running smoothly.

The rest of the group had gathered for the meeting, though most people seemed to be there to listen more than to contribute. Everyone wanted answers, but no one seemed to have any.

"We're going to have to try to find them," Rick said, "but I feel like it's going to be like looking for a needle in a haystack."

"We oughta start where we seen them people," Beau said. "I reckon if they still there then they just as likely ta be the ones that did this as anybody else."

"I agree with that," Daryl said. "Whoever done it has gotta be close enough it weren't no trouble for 'em ta see what was happenin' 'round here."

"On the same note," Rick said, squeezing his temple, "we haven't exactly been low key. Especially with those two," he pointed at Beau and Libby who were sitting side by side, "traipsing around the countryside. There's no telling how much attention we've drawn to ourselves simply by not paying attention to the fact that there were others around."

Sadie, reading from her customary position over Michonne's shoulder, waved her hand to get Daryl's attention.

"What do we do with the other group?" She asked. She looked around and shrugged. "Do we just walk up to their camp, say hello to them, and ask them if they're the ones who paid us a visit in the middle of the night? What about the Walkers? Did they bring them with them or was it their lucky night that a herd was passing through?"

"I think she's suggesting that we're probably going back to war," Junior said from his position. "If they attacked us, then we can't just go and make nice with them. Especially if they brought the Walkers."

"So what do we do?" Mark asked. "Do we just decide to attack them back? What if it wasn't them? Are we just going to open fire on a group that we don't even know is violent just because they're in close proximity to us at the same time that we happen to have been attacked?"

"I don't think we can just go in there guns blazing like we did with that last group," Rick said. "It could be that we made a bad call there. Hell, it could be that they made a bad call the other night by coming after us the way they did. Maybe if we could open up some kind of line of communication, then maybe we could come to some sort of peaceful agreement."

"Buncha crazy asses killed ya people an' burnt down part a' ya home an' ya wanna bake 'em a cake?" Libby spat suddenly. "That ain't tha way they work, apparently. They let all them damn slobberin' assholes in here an' they woulda killed every damn one a' us!"

"Just settle down!" Daryl snapped. Beau put a hand on Libby's shoulder as though to calm the girl. "We ain't makin' no snap decisions here, but everybody's got a right to say what they got on their mind, it don't mean we gotta go yellin' at one another. We already lost four people, we don't need to be naggin' amongst ourselves."

"I think everyone has a point so far," Michonne said. "On the one hand, if the group was the group that attacked us, we're not exactly going to be able to play nice with them. I think there are far too many feelings involved for that to go well. On the other, we don't _know_ that it was them. We haven't got a clue how many people are out there or how many people might want what we have here. We need some sort of way of making contact with them."

"It boils down to this," Rick said, "we have two choices. We either stay here or we move on. If we stay here we're like sitting ducks. We're stationary and we're open to attack. If we move on, we're out in the open dealing with Walkers like we did before. Neither option is a completely safe option. We've got to decide, as a group, which is the better one, though."

"We ain't movin' on right now," Daryl said. "We done worked too damn hard ta make this place what the hell it is an' we got a good thing here. If we didn't, wouldn't no damn body else want it. I say we stand our ground here an' we don't even talk about movin' on 'til at least the spring."

"I've got to say," Glenn said, "that I agree with Daryl. Moving on just isn't a reasonable thing to do right now. We've got food, we've got supplies. They burned out some of our supplies, yes, but they didn't get most of it. We can hold here for a good while. If we move we're more vulnerable than we are here."

"So we're back to square one," Rick said. "We stay here, fine. We've still got to figure out what we do about other groups. Winter's coming, and everyone knows that. If the other groups in the area are stationary groups then they're trying to stock up as well. That could be why they attacked us. If they're afraid of being starved out, then they'll do what they have to do in order to survive. We're running on basic human instinct here."

"We need an ambassador," Sadie said suddenly. "Someone who can speak for the group. Someone who can talk to them, talk to others that we might encounter. Find out who we're dealing with."

"So someone who could figure out if we can handle things peacefully or even work together?" Mark asked.

"She coulda died too," Libby said. "Sadie, ya wanta work with tha same damn people that woulda killed ya?"

Sadie read what Michonne wrote and shrugged.

"Nothing is going to be easy, but our other plan didn't work. We killed another group and we were still attacked. We do need numbers," Sadie said.

"Wait," Daryl said, "now you talkin' 'bout askin' this group to join us? That weren't what we was talkin' 'bout."

"I don't think Sadie was talking about just inviting them to move in with us, and neither was I," Mark said. "We're all throwing out a lot of ideas here. We need every possible solution on the table if we're going to pick one that's good for the group. If we had an ambassador of sorts, then they could at least go in neutrally and try to find out about the other group…or anyone we come across for that matter."

"OK," Daryl said, "so we pick someone to speak for our group. That's fine, but they ain't goin' in there or anywhere without backup. That'd be just stupid."

"True," Michonne said, "but just because they have backup doesn't mean that it has to be visible backup. Beau is damn near invisible but the kid can hit a moving target from about four miles away with a rock."

Beau chuckled.

"I ain't that good," Beau said. "But I would go in as backup if'n we was sendin' someone out ta talk to 'em."

"OK, we have a backup plan and apparently we're going to try to talk to this group," Daryl said. "Who does the talking?"

"Who's the least intimidating of the group?" Mark asked. "Whoever goes has got to be someone who demands enough respect that they won't immediately be discredited, but they've got to approachable enough that the group won't freak out just from seeing them."

"Well it was Sadie's idea," Daryl said.

Rick eyed Daryl and then turned to Michonne.

"Don't write this down, Michonne," Rick said. "Daryl, do you really think we need to send Sadie out to communicate with people? It's going to take her ten minutes to explain to the group how they have to talk to her."

"Rick's right," Sadie said, reading over Michonne's shoulder.

"I told you not to write that," Rick said.

Michonne shrugged at him.

"Don't say it if you don't mean it," Michonne said. "Besides, Sadie isn't under any illusions about herself."

"I'll do it," Glenn said.

Everyone turned their attention to him. He ran his hand through his hair and somewhat shrugged.

"I'll talk to them," he said. "I'm not some scary guy, so I won't freak them out, but I _am_ a guy so if we come up on some kind of he-man woman hating group it's not like they won't talk to me based on my gender. No offense, ladies, but the fact remains that we're learning a whole bunch about human nature here and I wouldn't be surprised at all if we don't encounter a group somewhere down the line that doesn't exactly treat women with the same respect as men."

"No, I think Glenn's right," Michonne said. "It needs to be a man. I'm fine with it being Glenn, but on the same token it might be better if it were Mark or Rick. Just like people may have issues with women, they could very likely prefer to deal with a _white_ man."

"I'll do it," Rick said. "I was a police officer…I've had training in dealing with people." He looked around and chuckled a little. "I know…I know that I haven't been exactly the ideal representative in the past, but I'm better now, and I want us to figure this out. I really don't want to move on before we have to either."

"OK, so what's the plan, then?" Daryl asked.

"We find the group," Rick said. "The first thing we do is try to figure out what we're dealing with. How big are they? What kind of society do they have? The details that we can figure out from a distance. Then we figure out the best way to approach them. I'll go with Beau, maybe someone else for backup, and I'll approach them and try to talk to them. Once we've got more information then we'll know how to proceed from there."

"Fine," Daryl said. "Then tomorrow morning we'll go out, just as the sun's coming up. You an' me. We'll get Beau an' Libby to show us where they seen this other group. We don't do nothin' but get a good look at 'em 'fore we discuss it."

"Sounds fair," Rick said.

"What if they're not the ones who attacked us?" Glenn asked.

"Then we gotta figure out who the fuck they was," Daryl said. "We stay on guard no matter what. We shouldn't have gotten as comfortable as we did an' we got burned for it."

"We need a better battle strategy," Sadie said. "If we're going to fight, and we probably are at some point, we need a better battle plan than a free for all."

"What do you mean?" Rick asked.

"Right now, what's our plan? We're attacked and everyone starts fighting…but we'll kill each other that way," Sadie said. "Yes, we all have to fight, and yes you have to fight if you're under attack, but we need some sort of organization in place if it's a situation where we can do things in a more orderly fashion."

"Well go ahead, Mars," Rick said with a chuckle. "What do we do?"

Sadie made a face at Rick when she'd read his commentary.

"Some people could use some training," she said. "We've got Walkers to practice on. We start training them in the down time. Some of us are rusty, it wouldn't hurt any of us. After that, we organize. Don't send in your best fighters to the fight first."

"What do we do?" Daryl asked. "Send in the weakest ones to get slaughtered?"

Sadie nodded.

"Yes…sort of. When a fight starts, everyone is stronger. We have more stamina. Send in the weaker ones then. If they live, great, if they don't then they've worn out the other side some. The stronger fighters can finish the job."

"That sounds like you're designating people to die, honestly," Mark said.

Sadie shrugged.

"If it's a fight to death, people are going to die. If weak fighters die and strong people live, then the strong people rebuild and withstand others. If the strong people die first, the weak ones will die anyway. Animal instinct," Sadie said.

"So who's gonna tell people they the weak ones that's gotta sacrifice themselves?" Daryl asked. "You gonna do that since ya so keen on it?"

"I will do better than tell them," Sadie said. "If we start working on a battle plan, I'll lead the first wave. I go in with them. If we've got to fight, and we know we're going to die, I'll be the first out there. It doesn't hurt my feelings."

"You're not some weak fighter, though," Rick said.

"I am," Sadie said. "I have to fight with my eyes. If it's dark, I'm weaker. People can take me from behind. I lose my sight, and I'm not much help to anyone."

"So this is what the hell we've come to?" Daryl asked. "Now we dividin' our group into those we can afford to let die an' those we can't?"

"It's always been that way," Sadie said, "I'm just pointing it out. We're weak and we're a small group. We need more people too. If any of the people we encounter can be trusted, we need to take them in."

"I can agree with that," Rick said. "We do need numbers. I think more than dividing our people into lambs to be slaughtered and lions, we'd do better if we had more numbers. We'd be a larger force to be reckoned with and they'd have a harder time picking us off."

"But more numbers means more mouths to feed, and that means more supplies," Junior said. "It means we might move more often."

"If they butcher us while we sleepin' then we don't need no supplies," Beau said. "I done been out there on my own once, an' I could do it again, but it ain't no great life. Ya get awful damn lonely when ya done lost everyone ya had."

Libby nodded her agreement with Beau, and Sadie and Mark also enthusiastically nodded.

"Fine," Daryl said. "If we can find people worth addin' ta the group, then we add 'em, but we ain't just bringin' in people without checkin' 'em out first."

"Even if we don't add them to the group, per se," Mark offered, "we could build a type of alliance with other groups. It's worked, at least somewhat, for governments. We help protect them, they help protect us. An agreement of sorts. We could maybe sweeten the deal by discussing trade. Working together on supplies might help the strain for everyone. Just because we work with them doesn't mean we have to sleep with them."

"First thing's first," Rick said. "Before we get ahead of ourselves we've got to see what we're dealing with. I'm all for preparing in case there's a battle, and I think Sadie's right in that we need to keep up with some kind of training regimen. We need to stay on our toes and not get caught sleeping on a possible threat again. We don't have to solve all the problems in a day, though."

"So tomorrow we go out," Daryl said. "We check out this other group and any other damn signs of life we run into on the way. Sadie, since ya so ready ta get us some kinda army assembled, ya can start trainin' people as ya see fit. We'll figure out what we gonna do about other groups as soon as we know what the hell we dealin' with. Any problems?"

Daryl waited a bit but no one brought anything else up. Slowly people started trickling out of the meeting to go back to their day to day. Daryl knew this wasn't going to be the last they spoke of this. In fact, he had a strange feeling that this was only the beginning. Perhaps their lives were likely to be very different than they'd ever imagined they would be. The only thing he could hope for at this time, though, was that they found the group they were looking for and figured out a way to handle the situation that would leave them able to sleep a little better at night without the constant threat that they would wake to a herd of Walkers prepared to devour them in their sleep.


	106. Chapter 106

Daryl and Rick followed Beau and Libby through the woods just as the sun was really coming up. The Walker threat, as it often did when winter was setting in, seemed a lot less daunting than before, and Daryl wondered if the herd that ripped through their community had been the last big herd of the season. If it had, boy hadn't they gotten lucky?

He was beginning to think that they weren't going to find the group that the two had seen earlier. He didn't know how far they had to go, but he felt like they'd already put in quite a bit of travelling and they'd seen next to nothing.

Finally, though, he picked up the scent of cooking meat just as Beau and Libby came trotting back from a few steps ahead, not saying anything but waving he and Rick forward. They stepped forward enough to see what the younger ones had seen.

Immediately Daryl got the feeling that this was not the camp that had attacked them, though he would have had no way at all of explaining that feeling to anyone. In front of them, at a little distance, he could see a camp that consisted of a farm house, an old barn, and what looked to be two small, free standing structures that had clearly been built by hand. Around the area were similar rudimentary fences like the old farm fences that they'd found the bull in. The fences had to be somewhat strong, however, because there were at least eight Walkers pushing against them, having spotted the people that milled around inside them.

From where they stood, Daryl could see that there were at least six women. Two of them looked to be older with long gray hair. They were dressed in well-worn dresses, and one of them carried a small baby on her hip that looked to be about Hope's age at best. The other four women were younger than the oldest two, with varying ages. The youngest probably not being much different in age than Libby, who crouched down near Daryl.

The women were all either black or Native American, though Daryl wasn't really sure either way. They were oblivious of Daryl's group hiding out in the thick brush of the woods surrounding their farmhouse. Daryl would have thought that the group consisted entirely of women, but as he hunkered down watching them, he noticed a man come out of one of the free standing structures and cross over to where one of the women was tending something that cooked on a fire.

The man was also black, and probably not much older than Daryl. He didn't wear a shirt, and his pants looked like they'd been patched several times over. Daryl thought the group looked a lot more weather beaten and worn than his own group.

When another man emerged from the same building, a little younger than the first, but also shirtless, Daryl realized there could be a lot more members to the group than met the eye. He stepped forward a little bit, trying to get a better feel for the group, and he stepped on a stick that cracked, drawing the attention of a Walker.

The Walker, apparently realizing that the meal behind him was easier to reach than the meal on the other side of the fence, turned its attention toward Daryl and his three comrades, which, in turn, drew the attention of a few other Walkers. They started slowly toward Daryl and he knew they'd have to kill them, and ultimately give up whatever cover they had.

He sighed and drew his knife, hoping the group was peaceful enough not to shoot them immediately. This wasn't how this was supposed to go, it wasn't how they'd planned it at all.

As the handful of Walkers reached them, Daryl stabbed at one of them and became aware that Rick, Beau, and Libby had also given up their cover. They all focused their attention on the small piled of Walkers until they had them down.

Once the last one dropped, Daryl glanced back in the direction of the group that they'd been watching. Now, though, they weren't focused on the meat on the fire. Instead they stood close to the fence line, staring out in the direction of Daryl and the others.

"We don't mean no harm," Daryl said, realizing that they were being watched now and there was no reason to pretend that they weren't there hiding in the thick brush. At a glance, none of them looked armed, but Daryl knew better than to trust that. He raised his hands, his knife still in one of them, and stepped forward. "We was just tryin' to see who was out here, we ain't here to hurt nobody."

As Daryl stepped forward, the old woman with the baby stepped behind the largest, and oldest, of the two men present and Daryl knew it was a natural reaction to strange people these days. The others in the group, though, didn't move from their positions.

Rick, Beau, and Libby were presumably behind him. Daryl hoped that all of them had the good sense to show their hands as well, just in case the group was under the law of shoot first and ask questions later.

Daryl continued walking forward slowly, his hands raised, and his eyes trained on the people in front of him. When he'd finally cleared the heavy brush, he spoke again.

"We weren't tryin' to startle ya," he said.

"Then what were you doing crawling around in the brush?" The voice of the older man boomed out.

Daryl nodded his head a little.

"We were afraid that if ya saw us, ya might shoot us," Daryl said. "Just trying to make it to see another day. Can we approach ya fences?"

The man nodded, and Daryl noticed that several of the group members stepped back a little. The old woman with the little girl peeked around the man, but she stayed protected by his rather large figure. Another of the women trotted off and toward the structure.

"You can walk up," the man said, "but keep your hands where we can see them. No one has to get hurt unless you decide they do."

"I got ya," Daryl said. He stepped forward until he was a couple of feet from the fences, and therefore, a couple of feet from the man in front of him.

"My name is Jeremiah," the man said.

"Daryl," Daryl offered.

"Are you alone?" Jeremiah asked. Daryl glanced quickly over his shoulder, wondering if he had been the only one of the small group that had stepped forward. Rick wasn't two feet behind him, though, and Beau and Libby were off to the side. He assumed that Jeremiah wasn't asking so much about him as about their little group in general.

"We alone for now," Daryl said, "but we part a' a big group."

"Bandits?" Jeremiah asked.

"Huh?" Daryl asked.

"Are you the bandits that tore down our fences and killed our cow?" Jeremiah asked.

"We ain't bandits," Daryl said.

"A couple of days ago three white men came through here," Jeremiah said. "I was off hunting with my boy and another man who lives here. When we got back they'd torn down the fences and killed our cow. You know anything about that?"

Daryl absentmindedly lowered one of his hands to scratch his neck.

"Not exactly," he said.

"What do you mean?" Jeremiah asked.

"Well, I mean we weren't the ones that done it, but I might know somethin' 'bout it. See, a couple a' days ago there was three men come to our community in the middle a' the night. They let a herd in on us and shot several of our people. Burned down part of our community. We lost four people and we got a couple that's wounded," Daryl said. "That's really why we here. Beau an' Libby spotted y'all a few days back and we thought ya mighta been the ones that come after us."

Jeremiah stepped to the side, looking at Beau and Libby. He turned, looking at one of the women.

"Have you seen those kids before?" He asked.

The woman he was speaking to nodded.

"I saw those two boys a few days ago. They were just passing by, riding an old nag or something," the woman said. She cut her eyes at Daryl. He figured her to be a little younger than Jeremiah perhaps.

"I ain't no boy!" Libby spat from over at the side. Daryl couldn't help but chuckle.

"Libby's a girl," Daryl said. "One of the people in our group hacked all her hair off 'cause she ain't combed it in a couple a' years, but when it grows back ya can see she ain't no boy."

"This is Anissa," Jeremiah said. "My wife, and she didn't mean any harm by thinking your girl there was a boy."

Daryl chuckled again.

"Ain't my girl, neither," Daryl said. "I got a girl, but she ain't much bigger than the one that woman's bouncin' on her hip."

Jeremiah looked at Daryl now, his brow knotted a little.

"You really weren't part of the group of bandits, were you?" Jeremiah asked.

Daryl realized, for the first time in a long time, it was his group that was on the worrisome end of questioning. He shook his head.

"No, we weren't part of that group, but we'd like to know who was. The men that attacked us, they're dead now. We ain't got no way of knowin' where they come from," Daryl said. He realized that Rick was beside him now, and they'd all lowered their arms without really thinking about the action. There wasn't anything threatening about this group, and it was easy to relax around them.

"If you find them," Jeremiah said, "we've got a bone to pick with them. We've got a baby coming sometime before the week is up probably, and we were counting on that cow to pick up the slack if Agaliha wasn't able to feed it enough."

"Who?" Daryl asked.

Jeremiah motioned toward the other old woman, the one without a baby, who stood off to the side.

"Agaliha is her granddaughter. We met up with a small group a while back. They were passing through, but you might say that one of them left a little piece of himself behind," Jeremiah said.

Daryl nodded. He couldn't help but think to himself that if this group ended up being one that they could get along with, and he was beginning to think it might be, then they may be able to help them out a little with that problem. He knew that Michonne was more than willing to nurse Paul when she had him, and Sadie made more milk than she needed for the baby half the time. Still, he knew better than to offer either of the women out as wet nurses without their consent.

"So y'all stayin' here?" Daryl asked. The man looked at him again, as though he were trying to see through him. Daryl realized the man was probably nervous about them, and he didn't know a thing about their group. "We got us a community," Daryl said, "'bout two miles maybe from here. We gon' stay as long as we can, but we likely gon' move out when the weather warms back up if we see any more groups like the ones we had hit us."

Jeremiah's face softened a little.

"We're holding out, best we can, until spring," Jeremiah said. "Then we're thinking of heading west."

"What's west?" Daryl asked.

Jeremiah shrugged.

"What's here?" He asked.

Rick stepped up then.

"I'm Rick," he said, gesturing at Jeremiah, but still not moving too close to the man. "Have you seen any other groups in the area? Anyone that you think might have been behind the attacks?"

Jeremiah shrugged a little.

"Honestly? Could have been anyone. There are a lot of groups around here. The farther you go that way," he gestured across their little farm, "the more groups you see. I hunt in that area…I've come up on more than my share of people. Lots of rough bunches."

"But no one in particular caught your attention?" Rick asked.

"Not really," Jeremiah said. "One dirty, rowdy asshole looks a lot like another. I try to stay out of their way and hope they don't make their way over here. A lot of the camps look like carnival camps almost. I figure most are passing through."

"So they aren't stationary?" Rick asked.

"Some are, some aren't," Jeremiah said. "The majority of them aren't. I haven't exactly gone looking for ones that were."

Rick looked at Daryl. Daryl knew they were going to have to talk about this. If they were in some kind of high traffic area, that could be troublesome. They also had to figure out what to do about the group they were face to face with now. He thought about what they'd discussed, about trying to form some kind of allegiance with other groups, but he wasn't sure exactly how that was supposed to work.

"Our community," Rick said after a moment, his face clearly lined with thought, "isn't too far from here. We've got a pretty decent set up, but we're a little rough for the wear right now because of this attack. We were hoping to find who did this, but we were also hoping to make friends with some groups. Would you be interested in meeting with us, maybe sharing a meal together, and talking about how we might be able to work together to make it through winter and keep people like that from attacking either one of us?"

Daryl smiled. Rick was stepping up to the plate and he was going to let him have it.

Jeremiah leaned against the wood of the fence, obviously thinking about Rick's question. The group's attention was drawn, for a moment, when some Walkers approached near Beau and Libby, but Daryl turned to the snarling in time to see the two of them drop the two Walkers. He'd almost forgotten they were behind them.

Jeremiah watched them for a minute as well. He ran his hand across his face, tugging at it.

"Would you come here or would we go there?" Jeremiah asked.

"However you like," Rick said. "We've got extra houses, though. If you wanted, you could come there, spend the night in one of the houses. You wouldn't have to travel after dark with the Walkers stirred up. We've got a lot of kids. If we wanted to keep them safe we'd have to leave most of them with caregivers at the community. You wouldn't get to meet everyone."

"We've got kids too," Jeremiah said. "Anna here is only a little over a year old and that baby's going to be here soon."

Rick nodded.

"I understand if you don't feel comfortable bringing them," he said.

"I didn't say that," Jeremiah said. "I don't make decisions here, at least not alone. We're a group. Altogether we're eight women and four men, children not counted. Nobody here makes all the decisions, and that includes me. I just happen to be the only one speaking for the group at the moment. Tell me how we find you and the boy here, Leland, will come and tell you what we've decided."

"Just like you don't make decisions on your own," Rick said, "we don't have any one spokesperson. Would you excuse me a moment while I speak with Daryl here?"

"Certainly," Jeremiah said.

Daryl watched as the audience they'd drawn spread out from the fence and went back to various tasks in their tiny little area. He stepped to the side, putting his arm around Rick's shoulder so that they could discuss things.

"I don't know why, but I trust 'em," Daryl said.

Rick nodded a little.

"I do too," Rick said. "Do we trust them enough to tell them where to find us, though?"

"Ya done invited 'em ta come, an' it ain't like it's gonna be too hard to find us if they had 'em a mind to," Daryl said. "If we could join up with 'em, that's a good number of people right there, and they look like hardy stock except maybe them two old women."

Rick nodded and chuckled a little.

"Don't discredit the old women," Rick said. "They've made it this long, and that's a lot longer than some half their age."

Daryl realized that Rick had a point. He didn't know how the two old women had made it, but they had. Furthermore, though they were obviously older, they didn't move like they were too stiff, and they looked to be well built. This group may not have a lot of clothing, but they weren't lacking in nutrition, that much was evident.

"They all look like they eatin' real good," Daryl said. "Ain't none of 'em sickly."

Rick looked over his shoulder.

"What?" He asked.

"All them people," Daryl said. "They all real healthy lookin'. They eatin' good. Some a' our people don't look like they eatin' near as good as them. They might can give us a few tips. Winter's comin' an' it's gonna get mighty cold. They don't look like they got clothes, but we got more than enough. I think we could maybe work up some trades with 'em."

"You might be right," Rick said. "Fine, we'll talk to them, tell them where to find us, and hope for the best. They might have some ideas about what to do about those other groups."

Daryl nodded his agreement and Rick turned. He went back to Jeremiah and told them how to find the community. Jeremiah smiled broadly for the first time and said that he would talk to the others, but he looked forward to getting to know them better in the future. Rick shook his hand and Daryl did too. Jeremiah gestured toward Beau and Libby, but neither stepped forward to shake his hand and Daryl apologized briefly, mumbling something about their lack of raising.

As Daryl and his small group made their way back toward the community, he had a good feeling about the small group. He didn't know exactly what their relationship would be like, and he wasn't certain that they'd invite them to stay within their community, but for some reason he felt like they were good people, and that they might end up being friends in the days to come.

"Rick, ya reckon we gonna figure out who attacked us?" Daryl asked as they were wandering slowly in the direction of home.

Beau and Libby had taken off somewhere. Daryl wasn't worried about them. He figured that the two of them would be back soon enough. They might even be on one of Beau's wild adventures and still manage to beat Rick and Daryl back to the gates.

"I don't know, Daryl," Rick said. "Honestly, I'm starting to think those men that are dead were the men who attacked us. I don't have any reason to think it, but I feel like whatever group they had, or whoever they were traveling with has moved on."

"They knew enough to know when to attack us, though, an' they knew we locked the gates with a chain," Daryl said. "To me that just sounds like they planned it."

"They might have," Rick said. "If they were in the line of being bandits, like Jeremiah suggested, then they probably weren't stupid thieves. Could have been that their men waited around until they saw they were in trouble and then they ran for it."

"Ya reckon they'd do that though? Just run off and leave their group behind?" Daryl asked.

"Not everyone has the group mentality," Rick said. "We can talk to Jeremiah a little more, though, and his other people if they come for a meeting. We'll see what we can figure out. They might even know some other groups that we can touch base with who might have some insight."

Daryl nodded, agreeing with Rick. They were coming in sight of the community now and Daryl could smell the scent of their own supper cooking over a fire. Daryl could hear the echoing sound of Judith mixed with the sound of conversation, and he knew that everyone would be milling about, taking care of the daily chores, and waiting to see if they'd found out who had attacked them. He wondered how they'd all react to finding out that they were already planning, even though it wasn't how they'd thought it would happen, to have one of their first ever peace meetings with another group.


	107. Chapter 107

It was almost dusk the next day when Rachel came to find Daryl. He was emptying a bucket into one of the watering troughs in the barn and she told him that there were people at the gate. Apparently they'd let them in because of the Walkers, but Mark was with them and making sure that they didn't try anything.

Daryl wiped his hands on his pants, put the bucket away, and started across the community with her. He'd expected Leland to be there, the boy from Jeremiah's camp, with word on how they might proceed, but it wasn't Leland that he saw.

Jeremiah stood near the gates. Beside him stood an old woman. Daryl couldn't be sure if it was one of the old women that he'd seen the day before, or if it was another one. Beside her stood a young girl who was very likely only eight or ten.

"Jeremiah," Daryl said, stretching his hand out toward the man. Jeremiah shook his hand. "Didn't expect to see ya here."

"This is Muh," Jeremiah said, motioning toward the old woman. "She heard that some of your group were injured and she wanted to come and see them. Muh's a healer."

Daryl cocked his head a little to the side. He'd spent much of his life hearing tales of healing people, but he'd never met someone that professed to be one, and he wasn't sure how much merit he put into it. The old woman in question was short, but she didn't look to be undernourished. She was wearing a dress that was as tattered as anything anyone else at the camp had been wearing, and around her shoulders she had a shawl bunched up that Daryl decided had likely once been a horse blanket, before moths had dined on the majority of the garment. Her hair was long and white and hung in a thick braid over her shoulder. She was scowling, but Daryl reasoned that due to her apparent lack of teeth, the facial expression might simply be the natural one for her to make.

"A healer, huh?" Daryl asked.

The old woman looked at him, a hint of a smile raising the skin around her toothless gums. She nodded slightly.

"Some would call me that," she said. "I've come to see your sick."

Daryl looked at Jeremiah. The man stood there calmly. The little girl eyed Daryl, but she didn't speak. She just stood beside the woman. Daryl looked at Mark and Mark shrugged at him, being of the infinite amount of assistance that Mark was sometimes.

Daryl finally sighed. If the woman thought she was a healer, or if she might do any good at all, he couldn't see what harm indulging her would be. He looked at the failing light, though, and wondered what had made them dare to be out at this hour.

"It's awful late," Daryl said. "I'm surprised the Walkers didn't try to tear ya up."

"It was a nice walk," Muh said. She smiled at Daryl again. "It's always a nice walk when you make it yourself."

"The Dead weren't bad on the walk," Jeremiah said. "We probably killed eight or so."

"We've got some stew leftover, ya missed dinner," Daryl said. "I'm sure Rachel can warm it up for ya though."

Rachel was standing near Daryl and nodded her head. She was marveling at the little old woman.

"The fire's still burning," Rachel said. "It won't be anything to warm it up."

"We'd appreciate it," Jeremiah said. "Any meal is a good meal."

"I'll see your ill, now," Muh said, reaching a hand out and touching Daryl's arm as though he'd forgotten she was standing there.

"Yes ma'am," Daryl said. He shot one last look at Jeremiah and left him there with the little girl. He led the old woman, who kept up with him to his surprise, to his house. She mounted the steps without a problem and followed him inside. Michonne was in the living room with the girls and she shot him an inquiring look. He glanced back at her, but continued with the old woman up the stairs and to the bedroom where Carol was in bed and Tyreese was holding his normal vigil.

Daryl knocked and Tyreese called, so he opened the door. Carol was asleep or unconscious, Daryl was never sure which applied in this situation.

"This is uh…Muh…" he said. "Says she's a healer and wants to look at Carol."

Tyreese got up from his spot and walked over, looking at the old woman. She nodded at Tyreese and he responded by returning the nod and shooting Daryl a look. The old woman reached her hand out and took Tyreese's. She sandwiched his hand between her two smaller ones.

"Are you this woman's mate?" She asked.

Tyreese looked at Daryl again and Daryl shrugged. He wasn't sure what to do with the tiny woman. She didn't seem to care much what he thought of her anyway. Tyreese smiled a little and nodded at the old woman again.

"I suppose you could say that," Tyreese said.

The woman nodded, her toothless smile visible again.

"Do you believe in healers, young man?" Muh asked.

Tyreese looked at Daryl again. Daryl wasn't sure what he wanted him to do.

"I guess…" Tyreese said. "I've never _met_ a healer."

"If you want to stay," Muh said, "then you'll have to decide. I can't have you here if you don't believe, or else I'll never help this woman."

Tyreese looked toward Carol and back at Daryl.

"I believe," he said. Muh nodded. She turned to Daryl.

"And you? Do you believe?" She asked.

Daryl wasn't sure what to do. He wasn't sure if he believed or not. He didn't want to be the reason that the old woman couldn't help Carol, though, if such a thing were possible. He shrugged.

"I can't say as I do and I can't say as I don't," Daryl said.

Muh regarded him a minute, working her jaws in contemplation.

"You'll have to leave then," Muh said. "Perhaps in time you'll learn to believe more than what your eyes can see. Until then, you'll have to leave."

Daryl shot a final look at Tyreese and made his way out the door, closing it behind him.

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When Tyreese was alone in the room with the strange woman, he wasn't sure what to do. She looked like something between a beggar and a fictional depiction of a witch. Her face was kind, though, despite the scowl she wore. He couldn't tell how old she was, but he had the strange feeling that she was far older than even her own body suggested. She walked to the side of the bed and pulled the cover back, exposing Carol.

Carol had been awake a little earlier, but she wasn't doing well. Mark had taken to trying to "keep her comfortable" and Tyreese had to admit that he wasn't comfortable with the phrase. If the little old woman could do anything, then he'd believe anything she said, even she told him that she was secretly some kind of fairy or something.

He watched as the woman ran her hands over Carol's body. Carol didn't respond, but he wasn't surprised. Whenever she was in one of these states she was less animated than a ragdoll.

"What happened to her?" The old woman asked, peeling back the bandage that was over Carol's gunshot wound.

Tyreese swallowed.

"She was shot," he said. "In the chest. Walker slowed the bullet down, but it cracked her sternum. We can't be really sure what else."

The old woman nodded a little. She examined the wound.

"The wound is nicely dressed," she said. "There's fever there, but when the sun is up I can draw the fever out." She leaned over and put her head to Carol's chest. Tyreese almost held his breath, hoping not to disturb her. The woman smacked her gums loudly and turned to look at him. "She's not well," she said.

Tyreese kept himself from rolling his eyes. He didn't want to doubt her, and he tried to remind himself of that, though he thought that anyone with eyes would have known that Carol wasn't well.

"Her position is wrong," the woman said. "If we don't move her, she'll die in less than three days. She won't rest, though, because it isn't time for her to pass."

"Not many of the dead rest these days," Tyreese said. "What do you think we should do?"

"I'll help you," Muh said. "We'll change her position. She will still need to heal. Like all living things, it will take time for everything to mend itself, but she won't pass on."

Tyreese nodded. He'd do whatever the old woman suggested. At this point it wasn't as though it could hurt.

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Daryl and Michonne sat with Jeremiah and the little girl in their new headquarters while the two guests ate some of the stew that was left.

"Where did you find this Muh?" Daryl asked.

Jeremiah chewed the bite of stew thoughtfully.

"On the side of the road," Jeremiah said.

"Alone?" Daryl asked.

Jeremiah shook his head.

"No, she was walking with Haralee, here, just strolling along," Jeremiah said.

Daryl turned his attention to the little girl.

"Are you her granddaughter?" Daryl asked. The little girl just stared back at him and turned her attention back to her food.

"Haralee doesn't talk," Jeremiah said. "Not to anyone but Muh, at least."

"And she's a healer?" Daryl asked. Jeremiah nodded.

"What do you mean by healer?" Michonne asked, finally.

"I mean she heals," Jeremiah said, "among other things."

"What other things?" Daryl asked. Jeremiah smiled at him and shrugged a little.

"She's everything that you never thought existed," Jeremiah said. "Strangest damn woman I've ever seen in my life. I'd damn near say she's magic."

Daryl looked at Michonne and back at Jeremiah. He was suddenly wondered exactly what they'd gotten themselves into.

"Magic? Like spells an' shit?" Daryl asked. Jeremiah shrugged again and chuckled.

"The whole nine yards," he said. "Leland fell about a year ago and sliced his leg on some old barbed wire that was half buried in the ground. Nearly cut the thing off. Muh stopped the bleeding with her hands, right before my eyes and the eyes of everyone around. I thought she was crazy until then, but Leland's just as good as he ever was. Now I don't doubt the woman. She talks a lot, and most of what she says doesn't make a whole lot of sense, but in hindsight she's never wrong."

Daryl considered what Jeremiah said. Jeremiah seemed like a straightforward man with a good head on his shoulders, not the kind that would buy into old wives' tales or other such nonsense. Daryl knew he believed in things that others sometimes questioned him about, like the time he saw the Chupacabra, and he supposed there could be worse things than believing that Muh was what she said she was. After all, they lived in a world where the dead came back to eat the living, how ridiculous was it to think that one old woman might have the ability to keep the living from becoming the dead so quickly?

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When Tyreese had followed the woman's instruction and padded the bed with cushions to create the angle that she designated, he sat on the floor near her and watched her. She leaned her head again to Carol's chest.

"Much better," Muh said. "She is already more at peace."

Tyreese nodded.

Muh began to run her hands over Carol's body again. She concentrated, especially, on rubbing her arms and her legs, intently focused for a few moments on what she was doing.

"You were not the one that marked her," Muh said. "Who marked her?"

Tyreese sighed.

"Her ex-husband," Tyreese said. "He died a while ago, several years, I guess. I've never put my hands on her that way."

Muh nodded slowly, her jaws working tirelessly behind her sagging cheeks.

"She bore his child," Muh said.

"Sophia," Tyreese said. "She died too. Got bit by one of the Walkers."

Muh's hands continued their rubbing and then she finally stopped, turning Carol's hand over, palm up. Muh ran her fingertips over Carol's hand. She reached around in the folds of her dress and came up with a small burlap bag. Tyreese watched as she gently pulled the bag open, spilling the contents over Carol's hand and onto the bed. She pushed at the contents a little with her finger and Tyreese shifted in an attempt to see what she'd spilled onto the bed. It looked like stones or small bones.

"So much death," Muh said, "but so much life…and the balance is tipped for life over death."

Tyreese stared at the old woman who was looking at the dark pieces of stone or bone or whatever they were. He felt a shiver run through him and he was beginning to feel a little strange about the old woman.

"Along our journey," Muh said, "we lose the thread from time to time, but it's always there, just out of site. When we find it again, then we know exactly where the road will lead." She picked up Carol's hand and held it close to her face, the corners of her mouth turning up a little. "And I have found my thread again."

"What are you talking about?" Tyreese finally asked. The woman turned and smiled at him, her toothless gums fully exposed.

"Her death day isn't near," she said. "She'll recover, with more life than before. She'll bare you a son."

"Carol's too old for children," Tyreese said. "We both are. This isn't exactly the best place or time to have children. The world's too dangerous now."

The old woman frowned at him, her scowl deepening far beyond that which she normally wore.

"The world is no more dangerous than it has ever been," she said. "You are young, and you don't know the ways of the world, but it's not the world that's changed. It's simply what you expect of it that has changed." She worked her jaws a minute, scowling at Tyreese, leaning in at him. He suddenly felt like he had as a kid when his mother or his grandmother would scold him for doing something that he shouldn't have been doing. "You let your doubt come in, and there's no room for it here," Muh said. "She will bare you a son, and I will deliver him. For your doubt, you shall name him Isaac."

Tyreese simply nodded at the woman. He was certain now that he had no idea how to respond to her. He swallowed and watched quietly as she returned her little tokens to her bag and the bag disappeared within the folds of her dress. She got up, pulling the blankets over Carol again, leaving the wound uncovered.

"Shouldn't you bandage her wound?" Tyreese asked, concerned.

Muh shook her head.

"The wound will not trouble her," Muh said. "Tomorrow I will coax the fever out and the wound will heal."

Tyreese decided that he would bandage the wound later, but first he would escort the old woman out, since she was now standing and clearly ready to leave. He opened the door, casting a glance back toward Carol. He didn't want to admit it, but her face looked more relaxed already, and her breathing sounded less labored. He sighed a little to himself and led the old woman out the door and down to headquarters where he found Michonne and Daryl with the girls, keeping the company of two other people.

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The old woman had come into headquarters with Tyreese and accepted her bowl of stew happily. She'd announced that Carol would live and begun to eat. Daryl couldn't help but notice that Tyreese looked concerned, or confused at best, and he wondered what had happened with the woman who called herself Muh.

"I will stay three days," Muh said. "I will see all your ill, and then you can decide." She turned her attention to Daryl.

"Decide what?" Daryl asked.

"Decide if you are to accept my offer," Muh said. She spooned another mouthful of soup into her mouth and Daryl watched as some of it dribbled down her chin.

"What offer?" He asked, looking to Jeremiah. Jeremiah didn't respond to him, though. He was looking at Muh.

"I will stay three days," Muh repeated. "If you accept, then I will stay until the next winter falls upon us."

"We don't even know if we're stayin' that long," Daryl said.

Muh nodded her head at him.

"You will stay," she said. "You will stay to see that spring, and then you will move. I won't be going with you, though. By then I will have chosen someone for Haralee."

Daryl looked at Michonne. Her facial expression let him know that he was not the only one wondering what the old woman was talking about.

"Why ain't'cha goin' with us? I mean if ya stayin'," Daryl said.

"My death day will come when the next winter falls," Muh said. "I will deliver Isaac, and then it will be time for me to pass on. By then, I will know who will care for Haralee until she is a woman."

"Who the fuck is Isaac?" Daryl asked.

"My kid," Tyreese said. Daryl looked at him and Tyreese shrugged a little. He looked at Michonne and she was no less confused.

"We'll stay the night," Muh said. "Tomorrow Jeremiah will return to the others." She looked at Jeremiah then, wiping her wet chin with her hand. "You'll come for me in three days," she said. "It will be time for me to deliver Agaliha's baby. Uwa will need me."

Daryl looked at Jeremiah who smiled at him a little. He chewed at the skin on his thumb, unsure of what to think about anything anymore.

"Ya can stay here," he said. "We got the room."

He wasn't sure what else to say, and he felt like he couldn't say not to the little woman. She didn't exactly leave the possibility open in any case.

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**AN: Before you ask, Muh is a fictional character, but she is based off the combination of a number of people that I have known or known of (for having passed on already). She combines some of the most interesting elements of those people into one entity for our story. **


	108. Chapter 108

When Daryl slipped out of the house with Judith on his hip and made his way to the new headquarters, Rachel was already making breakfast and the little old lady wandered around her, the quiet girl standing nearby.

Daryl put Judith down and watched as she bolted off. He turned his attention then and noticed Beau not too far off, heading in the direction of the barn. Judith was after him.

"Jude's comin' at'cha!" Daryl called. Beau turned and raised a hand at Daryl, showing that he saw the little girl making as much time as possible on her tiny legs.

Daryl made his way over to Rachel and the old woman.

"Where's Jeremiah?" Daryl asked.

"He's gone," Muh said. "He'll be back in three days." She turned then, squaring herself in front of Daryl and looking him up and down for a moment. "I'll see your people today," she said. "I'll require two fires. Haralee shall tend them for me. I will need two pots, one for each fire."

Daryl nodded at her.

"I'll have my meal," she said. "Then I will talk to the fever of the woman I saw yesterday. The baby that's to come, it's yours?"

Daryl nodded. He noticed Rachel glancing at him over her shoulder. Muh smiled at him.

"It's not well, but it will be," she said. "I'll see to the child when I'm done with the fever."

Daryl chewed his thumb. He didn't like the suggestion that there was anything wrong with the baby. No one else thought there was anything wrong with it, and Michonne hadn't mentioned any concerns. He wondered if he should go and ask her about it. He decided to wait, though. She was at the house with Hope and would come to breakfast soon enough.

Daryl offered to carry the pot for Rachel when breakfast was ready and she let him, following him into the new house and doling out portions of food to everyone. Muh didn't come for her bowl. Instead, she sat at the table, her spoon in hand, and waited until Daryl brought her a bowl, smiling at him in all her toothless glory before she began to eat, not waiting on anyone else.

Over breakfast, everyone stared at the old woman, but she didn't speak to anyone. She ate steadily until she'd finished her bowl and then she got up from the table. She stopped near Daryl for a moment and put her hand on his arm.

"I'll be back," she said. "And then I'll talk the fever out of the woman and Haralee will prepare the drink for your child."

"Where are ya goin'?" Daryl asked the woman.

"I'm going for a walk," she said. "To the woods."

"Alone?" Daryl asked. He started to get up from the table. "There's Walkers out there," he said, beginning to think that the old bat had gone senile.

Muh flashed her gums at him again.

"I will lay to rest anyone who wishes for rest," Muh said.

Daryl sighed and wrinkled his brow at her.

"Ya do know them things'll eat ya, right?" He asked. She smiled again.

"Today is not my death day," Muh said. "My death day will come…"

"I know, I know….when the next winter falls on us," Daryl said. "I heard that, but the Walkers can't hear."

Muh squeezed his arm and walked off without saying anything else. Daryl looked around and all eyes were on him. He heard the woman leave the house and sighed.

"Do I go after her?" He asked Michonne. He almost laughed at her facial expression.

"I don't know," Michonne said. "Did she park her broomstick outside?"

Daryl snickered.

"She wants to see you too," Daryl said. "Said the baby's sick."

Michonne wrinkled her brow at him and rubbed her stomach protectively.

"What's wrong with it?" She asked.

Daryl shrugged.

"Beats me," he said, "but she said she's gon' fix it."

Michonne rubbed her belly, now looking more concerned than she had before.

"Beau," Michonne called, catching the attention of Beau who was balancing Judith on his knees while he ate.

"Yeah?" He asked.

"Would you go after that old woman, please? Make sure she doesn't get eaten," Michonne said.

Beau nodded and quickly swallowed down the last of his breakfast, passing his bowl to Mark who was sitting beside him and putting Judith on the floor without another word.

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"I don't know if she's crazy or not," Tyreese said. He was walking with Daryl and carrying water back to the community. "All I know is that this morning Carol asked for breakfast, and that hasn't happened."

"So maybe Carol's just gettin' better," Daryl said.

"Or maybe the crazy little woman knows what the hell she's doing," Tyreese said.

"She wants to look at 'Chonne when we get back," Daryl said. "Said she thinks there's somethin' wrong with the baby."

"Can it really hurt for her to take a look?" Tyreese asked.

Daryl didn't suppose it could hurt for her to look at Michonne. Tyreese seemed sold on the old woman and Beau had reported that while they were out and the woman was filling her shawl with all kinds of sticks and plants, they'd hardly been troubled by Walkers at all, whether because of the weather or otherwise.

"Beau said she put down a Walker," Daryl said. "Said she talked to the damn thing after she did it too, just like it could hear her."

Tyreese shook his head a little.

"I don't care if she talks to Walkers, eats bark, and crushes bugs in that tiny little bowl she made that smelly shit in…Carol feels better and Mark hadn't made that shit happen yet," Tyreese said.

Daryl chuckled at him.

"It's only the end of the world, right?" Daryl asked. "If she's so good at savin' people, though, then why ya reckon she's so set on what she calls her death day? Why don't she just keep on livin'?"

Tyreese shrugged.

"Everybody has to die sometime, right? Maybe she's OK with it," he said. "Don't you think when you were as old as she is that you might be OK with dying?"

Daryl wasn't sure. He didn't know how old the woman was and she hadn't offered that information. She hadn't offered them much information, in fact, that didn't come wrapped up with some kind of riddle.

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Michonne wasn't entirely sure she believed in the little old woman. She'd spent part of the morning, though, with Carol, and it had been the first time that she hadn't been worried about her. Carol was weak, that much was true, but the color was in her face again and she'd even teased Michonne a little about the entire event being a conspiracy so that she could get a break from laundry and meals.

And now Michonne, perhaps against the most logical side of herself, was lying on her bed half naked while the little woman shuffled leaned over her, having dismissed Daryl earlier for not believing and for having a negative energy.

"Do you believe in healers?" Muh asked, leaning over Michonne. Michonne almost smiled at her. Part of her screamed that she didn't, but really she had to admit that she wasn't sure.

"I'm not sure," Michonne said.

Muh leaned in, working her jaws. Michonne focused on her face a little. The old woman looked like the dried apple dolls that her grandmother used to have in her kitchen. One of the woman's eyes was a bright brown color, almost gold, and the other was half clouded over, very likely because of cataracts. She didn't have a tooth in her head, as Michonne's grandmother would have said.

"You have a strong spirit," the woman said. "If you don't believe, there's nothing I can do for you, or the little one."

Michonne's stomach churned. She hadn't said anything to anyone, but she worried about this baby. She didn't know if something was wrong or if it had been her imagination, but lately she had uneasy about the baby. No one else had said anything to her, or asked her anything, beyond Daryl's common questions about whether or not everything was alright, but he asked them without any real question in his voice. The little woman, though, seemed to believe that something was amiss, and furthermore, she seemed to believe that whatever it was could be made right.

Muh turned, though, and started as though she would leave the room.

"Wait," Michonne said. Muh turned back. "I believe," Michonne said.

"Are you sure you believe?" Muh asked, approaching the bed again.

Michonne nodded.

"I'm sure," she said. Muh nodded at her.

"Close your eyes," the old woman said. Michonne did as she asked. She felt Muh running her fingers over her body, probing at her. The baby inside her squirmed and reacted. "This baby," Muh said, "it has a warrior's spirit."

Michonne snickered a little.

"Gets that from its father," Michonne said.

"No," Muh said. "You have a warrior's spirit. Your man, he is a seeker. They are more intuitive than warriors, but they take longer to arrive at their battles. This baby is a warrior."

Michonne kept her eyes clothes and felt herself drifting. Underneath the touch of the woman's hands she could feel herself relaxing more than she had in the past few days.

"Why are you angry with your baby?" The woman asked.

Michonne opened her eyes then.

"What?" She asked.

"Why are you angry with it?" Muh repeated. "Close your eyes."

Michonne laid her head back down and closed her eyes.

"I'm not angry with the baby," Michonne said.

"You are not happy with it, and it knows that," Muh said. "You're fighting it, so it's fighting back. You forget that you share the same spirit. The baby is smaller, but spirits are all the same size."

"I'm not fighting with it," Michonne protested. She wasn't even sure how you would fight with a fetus. She wasn't angry with the baby. She wasn't exactly thrilled with being pregnant right now, but she wasn't angry with the baby for that. It just wasn't the best timing. She hadn't really thought things out as clearly as she thought she had once upon a time, and now she was worried about what might happen, but that didn't mean she was angry with the baby.

Muh's fingers continued their gentle probing.

"You don't have to tell me that you're not angry with it," Muh said. "I know the truth. You need to let go of your anger, though. Even the warrior must be at peace sometime."

Michonne might not feel angry with the baby, but she knew she wasn't at peace right now. It was impossible to be at peace with everything happening around them like it was. Still, she didn't really know how to respond to the woman.

"Is this uncomfortable?" Muh asked. Before Michonne could respond, the woman probed her and she hissed at her. The woman moved her fingers and repeated the action and Michonne put her hand up to stop her, opening her eyes and sitting up a little. "I thought so," Muh said. She smacked her gums and regarded Michonne a minute. "I am going to make you something. While I'm gone, I want you to lie here." She reached out and took Michonne's hand, pressing it to her belly. "I want you to talk to your baby. Explain to it why you are fighting it. Decide for yourself if you want the child to be well. If you do, then you'll drink what I give you, and you will give up the fight against it."

"I don't…" Michonne started. The woman put her hand up to silence her.

"It isn't me that you need to explain yourself to," Muh said. "I will be back."

Michonne watched the old woman leave the room and she lowered herself back down on the pillow. She rubbed her belly, feeling the baby kick against her hand, and wondered if there was any merit in what the woman said. She wondered if the baby knew about her stress and the hint of regret that she'd been feeling. She decided, at least while the woman was gone, that it wouldn't do any harm to have a conversation with her little one. At least no one else was around to witness it, so they wouldn't think she'd gone crazy for having a serious discussion with a baby that was currently hanging out in her uterus.

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When Daryl saw the old woman coming down his porch steps, he tried not to seem as anxious as he was. He'd been sitting outside holding Hope and waiting on her, worried that something was happening and he wasn't allowed to be there.

"Is she OK?" He asked.

Muh stopped at the bottom of the step. She reached her arms out to Hope and the little girl reached for her. Daryl let her sink into the old woman's arms and watched as Muh gave her a toothless smile to which Hope responded by offering a grin of her own.

"She will be," Muh said. "Sometimes mothers have to be reminded that whether they hold their children in their wombs, their arms, or their hearts, they are first and foremost mothers. She has become angry toward the child, but they will work out their differences, and when she is at peace, so will be the little one."

Muh started off then, Hope riding on her hip. Hope looked over her shoulder and waved at Daryl. He started behind them.

"Ya ever say anythin' that makes any sense?" Daryl asked, following after the old woman until they reached the fires that the little girl was tending.

"Every sound means something to ears that are listening," Muh said. Without putting Hope down, she stooped and burrowed through a pile of things that were in her shawl which was laid open on the ground. She offered the things silently to Haralee who took them and started to mash some of them in the bowl Muh had requested earlier. When Muh was done passing the items to the girl, she stood up and looked at Hope for a moment. The girl was enthralled with tugging at some of the hair that had come loose from the woman's braid. "This one, she has your eyes."

Daryl looked at Hope. Hope didn't have his eyes, not at all. Her eyes were shaped like Michonne's, but the color of her eyes were almost the same yellow color of the one good eye of Muh. Daryl thought it was a pretty color, like some of the leaves you could find in fall, but it wasn't anything like the color of his own eyes. He wondered, suddenly, if Muh could see very well.

"She ain't got my eyes," Daryl said softly. "Mine is blue, but hers is kinda yellow."

Muh laughed a little, a light laugh.

"I didn't mean the color," she said. She didn't offer any further explanation, though. She passed the girl back to Daryl and overlooked the little girl for a moment.

Daryl had no idea what the relation between the two was. The girl was far too young to be the child of the old woman. The woman's skin was the color of a wet paper bag, and it was almost as wrinkled. The girl's skin was olive colored, a shade lighter, perhaps than Hope's. The girl had long, stringy black hair that fell nearly to her waist her eyes were a darker brown than the old woman's eyes. She was thin, but not undernourished. Daryl wondered why she didn't speak, or apparently only spoke to Muh.

"Is she your grandkid?" Daryl asked finally.

Muh looked at him, wiping her fingers with part of her skirt. She shook her head.

"Ya kin?" Daryl asked.

The corners of Muh's mouth turned up.

"We are all kin," Muh said. "Haralee is no different."

Daryl didn't think it was a very satisfying answer, but it was about the same as all the other answers he'd been given. He watched as Muh quietly stirred the contents of the pot that Haralee was now focused on.

"I need something for your woman to drink from," Muh said.

Daryl nodded and started toward the headquarters. When he returned carrying an oversized mug, having left Hope with Rachel inside, Muh accepted it and carefully poured the liquid from the pot into the mug, reaching in and picking out whatever things fell in that she didn't want. Without so much as addressing the girl again, Muh started back toward his house and Daryl trotted after her.

Daryl followed Muh through the house and she didn't stop him when they got to the bedroom. Michonne was lying on her side on the bed, half naked. She'd pulled a piece of the blanket over her to cover herself, but she didn't seem bothered at all by her nudity.

"Have you made peace with your child?" Michonne asked.

Daryl saw Michonne glance at him, somewhat nervously, and then she told Muh that she had. The old woman offered her the mug.

"Drink this, then. You need to rest. You will be tired from the conflict, but you will feel better once you've rested and come to peace," Muh said.

Daryl walked in then, and Muh didn't stop him. He sat on the foot of the bed and put his hand on Michonne's foot, wondering momentarily if she should drink the liquid. She didn't hesitate, though, she sat up, close to Muh, and sipped at it.

"It's not bad," she said, looking at Daryl after she took a sip. Daryl looked at Muh.

"What is it?" He asked.

"You could say it's a tea," Muh said. "It will wash out all the anger that she's built up, and now she won't make anymore."

Michonne drank the liquid and Muh watched her drink it. Daryl watched both of them with curiosity.

"Why the negativity for the little ones?" Muh asked after a moment. Michonne didn't respond. She just kept sipping at the liquid. Muh looked at Daryl then.

He wasn't sure how to answer the question.

"We ain't negative," he said. "It's just that babies…well…we know a lotta things can happen."

"Isn't that the beautiful thing about them?" Muh asked.

Daryl noticed Michonne stopped drinking and Muh reached her hand out, tipping the bottom of Michonne's mug to urge her to continue.

"It's just they hard to take care of," Daryl said. "With Walkers an' everything else, they could get killed. And we lost Judith's real mama when she was born. I reckon they make us a little jumpy."

"Somewhere," Muh said, "you have forgotten that babies mean life, not death, and you have not yet learned that death is not a tragedy. It will do you all good to remember that. Each of us must travel the same path. We must all be born to begin our journey, and at the end of the road, we all must die. We rest from one journey, and we begin another."

"What's the other one?" Daryl asked.

Muh looked at him for a moment, and smiled a little.

"It's different for us all," Muh said. "Just like this journey. We may travel together for a while, but we each have our own journey. No two are alike."

Muh reached out then and took the mug that Michonne had drained.

"You should rest now. Soon you will feel better and the baby will too. It's not resting, and it needs to rest a little. The journey for the child will begin soon, before the moon completes its full cycle," Muh said.

Michonne put her hand on her belly.

"No," she said. "We've got about a month and a half."

Muh put her hand on top of Michonne's, her fingertips resting on Michonne's belly. She shook her head.

"No," she said, "it won't wait that long."

Michonne shot Daryl a look and he had no idea how to interpret any of the madness around him.

"Is he gonna be OK?" Daryl asked.

The woman nodded.

"Strong and healthy," she said, "fighting from the birth no doubt." She turned back to Michonne and this time squeezed her shoulder. "Just rest," she said. "We'll all be here to celebrate the start of another journey."

Muh nodded at both of them and walked out of the room. Daryl heard the sound as she opened the door across the hall and closed it behind her, apparently going to check on Carol. He got up and pushed the bedroom door closed.

"'Chonne, do ya think she's OK?" He asked.

Michonne stared at him a few minutes, still rubbing her hand over her belly. She nodded and lie back on her side on the bed, tugging at the edge of the blanket that was thrown over her earlier.

"Where's Hope?" Michonne asked, yawning.

"With Rachel," Daryl said. Michonne nodded again.

"I'm tired, Daryl," she said. "Will you lay with me a minute? Just until I fall asleep?"

Daryl came over and toed off his shoes. He crawled up in bed and fixed the blanket over Michonne that she had been struggling with. He slid next to her and wrapped his arm around her, smelling her scent at the crook of her neck.

"I hope it was OK ya drank that stuff," Daryl said.

"I think it was fine," Michonne said. She moved Daryl's hand and he felt the baby gently kick against his palm. "The baby's calming down, at least, and I'm sleepy now."

Daryl kissed the back of Michonne's neck and felt her twine her fingers through his, his palm still resting over the spot where their youngest was growing.

Daryl stayed there, curled up with Michonne while he listened to her drift off. While he lie there, he heard the rustling about of Muh outside the room as she went down the stairs and let herself out of the house. He didn't know where she was headed next, and he still wasn't sure what he thought of her. She had declared so many things. Some of them made sense, and others didn't. Daryl wondered if he'd ever figure out the old woman, or if the next winter would fall upon them, apparently bringing her death day, before he'd even begun to wrap his mind around everything she said and did.


	109. Chapter 109

When Daryl finally left Michonne sleeping and slipped out of his house, he found Beau in the street, sort of loafing around with Judith on his shoulders, her hands digging in his hair, commanding that he "ride her". To comply with her wishes, Beau would pace a few steps and then return to his spot until she got unbearable again.

"What'cha doin'?" Daryl asked, walking up to Beau.

"Watchin' that ole woman," Beau said. "She just does whatever she wants ta do an' she don't listen ta no one. Libby's done run her outta the storage house twice."

Daryl stepped past the boy and made his way to the storage house. He found Muh there, sitting on the steps. Beside her was an open jar of the peaches that Carol had canned from the orchard and in her hand was a pipe. She popped one of the peaches into her mouth and smacked at it unceremoniously. When she swallowed, she puffed at the pipe. It was only as she exhaled the smoke that she looked up at Daryl.

She stared at him a moment and then fingered an old gray sweater that she was wearing. Daryl recognized it as one of the many garments they kept in a rag box in the storage house for whenever they needed cloth for things. Anything that got too terribly worn or ragged got tossed in there, or if it was terrible enough that all the women banished it then it went into the box as well. The gray sweater, in particular, had a large hole in the side of it where Carol had once been wearing it and snagged it on the rabbit pens.

"If this isn't spoken for," Muh said, "I found it and I'd like to lay claim to it." She dug another slice of peach out of the jar and crushed it in her mouth, bits of it dribbling out without causing her any concern whatsoever.

"That's just an old rag," Daryl said.

Muh cackled.

"And so am I," she said. "We shall make fine companions."

"Did'ja find them peaches an' that pipe too?" Daryl asked.

Muh looked at the jar of peaches first and then puffed the pipe again, thoughtfully.

"I found the peaches," she said. "The pipe's been with me for many years."

Daryl nodded at her. He'd never seen an old woman smoke a pipe, but he was sure that stranger things had happened. He didn't begrudge her neither the peaches nor the ratty sweater. If anything she said was true, and if she brought any relief to anyone in the community, it was well worth the price of a sweater they'd have thrown out and a jar of peaches.

Daryl walked away again, back toward Beau who was still somewhat riding Judith around.

"What'cha think of her?" Daryl asked the boy. Beau shrugged a little in response, holding tight to Judith's foot so the girl wouldn't slip from her perch. "Ya reckon anything she says about healin' people's got any merit to it?"

"Don't know," Beau said. "We ain't exactly seen her heal nothin' yet."

Daryl thought about it. He glanced back at the old woman who was leaning against the railing, puffing her pipe and smacking on peaches. Carol was better, so Tyreese and Michonne said, but that could simply be because it was time for her to be better. Michonne was sleeping, but that wasn't something so unusual. Daryl wanted some kind of test for the woman. He tried to figure out what they could do that might test to see if this woman had any super powers at all, or if she was just a crazy old woman.

"I think I got it," Daryl said after a minute. Beau looked at him, one eyebrow raised. "If'n she can heal then we'll bring her Sadie. If she's got all these great powers or whatever, then she oughta be able to make Sadie hear."

Beau looked like he was considering it for a moment. Finally he nodded.

"Could work," Beau said. "An' if Sadie could hear then she wouldn't get caught up by nobody comin' up on her like she does."

"Where's Sadie?" Daryl asked.

"Don't know," Beau said. "I ain't her keeper. I reckon she's at her house. I ain't seen her since breakfast."

Daryl started toward Sadie and Mark's house. When he got there, he walked up the steps and knocked on the door. Mark opened it.

"Is Sadie in here?" Daryl asked. "We need her for somethin'."

Mark shook his head.

"No, I've got Paul. Sadie went down to work at the barn," he said. Daryl reached over and plucked Judith off of Beau's shoulders.

"Can ya keep Jude for a while too?" He asked, offering her to Mark who nodded and accepted the girl.

"Come on," Daryl said to Beau when Mark had closed the door.

They made their way past the porch where Muh was still enjoying her break. They slipped down to the barns and found Sadie down there working on tearing out some of the area that Tyreese had long since designated as material that needed to go to make more room for the animals.

Daryl walked in and caught Sadie's hammer as she swung it backwards, unaware of their presence. She turned as he did, shocked at first, but then she smiled.

"What's wrong?" She asked.

"Ain't nothin' wrong, we need ya for a few minutes though," Daryl said.

"Why?" Sadie asked.

"That old woman," Daryl said, "Muh? She says she's a healer."

"Yeah? So what?" Sadie asked, crinkling her face slightly. Daryl reached up and pulled the safety goggles off her face, putting them on the ground with her hammer.

"So we gon' find out if she's really a healer, we goin' to get her to fix ya ears," Daryl said.

"What?" Sadie asked. Daryl wrapped his arm around her waist and pushed her forward, out of the barn.

"Ya ain't gonna have to ask that so much if this woman ain't no hoax," Daryl said. He squared Sadie in front of him when he got out the barn. "If she's a healer, we gonna get her to fix ya ears," he said, drawing his words out. He knew Sadie had understood him, but she was still looking at him like he was insane. There was an old woman sitting on a porch not too far from them eating peaches, smoking a pipe, and declaring that she could heal people, and Sadie was looking at him like he had three heads. "She can heal ya, fix ya so ya can hear," Daryl said again.

"I'm not sick," Sadie said, the look not leaving her face. "I'm deaf, not broken."

Daryl sighed and pulled her toward the storage house where he'd last had his accounts of Muh. He felt Beau behind her, pushing her along. When they finally made it back, Muh was sitting in the same place, though she'd apparently eating her fill of the peaches, having screwed the lid of the jar back on, and her pipe had vanished just as inexplicably as it had appeared.

"Got'cha someone to heal," Daryl said, squaring Sadie in front of the steps and holding her in place by her hips.

Muh got up and descended the steps to stand on the bottom one, bringing her almost to Sadie's height. She peered at the woman, and reached out, touching her face.

"She has some fever," Muh said, "is that all that she needs?"

"She can't hear," Beau said.

Muh stood there, working her jaws a moment, considering Sadie.

"When did it start?" Muh asked. Sadie turned her head, searching out Beau or Daryl. Daryl realized that maybe it was harder to read Muh's lips since they had a tendency to flop and flutter out.

"Ya always been deaf?" Daryl asked, craning his head around so that Sadie could see him. She nodded.

Muh smiled.

"You can't heal those that aren't sick," Muh said. "What is her name?"

"Sadie," Beau offered.

"She's a gifted one," Muh said. "No more in need of healing than me."

"She can't hear," Daryl said.

Muh nodded at him.

"The gifted must trade one thing for another sometimes," Muh said. "She cannot hear, but she has other gifts. She can see, perhaps, things that you cannot see. Things even your ears couldn't let you know. I can take care of her fever, but I would not touch her gifts."

Daryl released his hold on Sadie then and she turned toward him, raising her eyebrows for clarification.

"She said ya got gifts," Daryl said. "She ain't gonna fix ya ears."

Sadie smiled.

"I'm not broken," she repeated.

"Yeah, I heard that too," Daryl said. "Ya got a fever so take the old woman with ya an' she's gonna fix that too."

Sadie felt her own forehead and shrugged a little.

"Fine," she said. "But I need help…I can't understand her very well."

"I'll go with ya," Beau offered. "Ain't like there's nothin' happenin' here, an' I gotta get Jude. I promised that me an Blue would take her an' Hope on a pony ride 'round the community."

"Don't'cha let my kid fall off that damn mule," Daryl said, suddenly.

Beau was starting to walk away with Sadie and Muh, leaving Daryl standing there.

"Ain't gonna fall," Beau said, "an' if she do we got us a healer, 'member?"

Daryl bit his thumb and tried to ignore the boy. He had no idea how they were going to find out if this woman was for real or if she was playing them in some way. Now that she had some kind of story about why she couldn't heal Sadie, it made him wonder what exactly healers could and couldn't do.

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Glenn wondered about the little old woman who was supposedly going about the community and helping people with their problems. Maggie's arm wasn't perfect, and he supposed he might could lure the tiny woman to speak to her under the pretense of helping with the injury, and perhaps the old woman could help him in some way to figure out what to do about Maggie's generally unresponsive nature.

He really didn't want to admit that he put much merit into things like healers, but he was desperate for something to help with Maggie. She was pulling away from him. She was pulling away from everyone, and he had no idea what to do about it.

When Glenn approached the old woman, she was leaving Mark and Sadie's house, alone, and walking back toward where she had left the small child that accompanied her. Muh stopped when she saw Glenn approaching, and waited quietly for him to state his business with her, her jaws constantly working in a fashion that mildly fascinated Glenn as he tried to explain himself.

"My wife," he said, not really knowing how to formulate all of his concerns and wishing that he had put more thought into it before approaching the woman, "she got hurt in a conflict that we had with another group. Her arm was injured and it's getting better, but it's not the same as it was. And then when the men attacked our community the other night, her sister was one of the people that we lost…I can't get her to talk to me. I don't know what to do."

The woman looked at him, narrowing her eyes for a moment. She put her hand on his arm, and smiled at him, or at least he assumed that's what the gesture was meant to be.

"What is it that you wish me to do for her?" Muh asked.

"I don't know," Glenn said, frustrated. "If I knew what to do for her…then I'd have done it by now. I just want you to make her feel better. I want to know what to say to her…she feels like she's lost everyone now that her family is gone, but I can't get her to understand that she hasn't lost me."

Muh nodded at him.

"Even the greatest of healers, young man, cannot heal a heart. I will talk to her, though," Muh said.

"She won't talk to you," Glenn said. "She's not talking to anyone."

The expression that Glenn hoped was a smile returned and then Muh smacked her jaws at him, nodding.

"She will talk to me…but first she will listen," Muh said.

Glenn sighed. He didn't know that Maggie would speak to the woman at all, but it was worth a try. He'd tried everything he could, but she was so angry with the world that the anger just spilled out on him. He showed the little woman to the house they shared and she disappeared inside, leaving him on the porch.

When the woman emerged from the house again, some minutes later, she was leading Maggie by the elbow. Glenn didn't know how she had coaxed Maggie out of the house, but he wasn't going to ask questions. Maggie didn't look at him, as she descended the porch steps being led as though she were blind by the woman that was a good deal smaller than her.

Glenn didn't know if he should stay or he should go with them, but at the final moment he decided that his curiosity required that he follow them.

Muh led Maggie down the street to the lot where their old headquarters had once sat. They'd almost completely cleared the ash and charred remains of Walkers and the structure that had once sat there, but the scorched land wasn't going to be quickly erased. There was a small tree that grew in the corner of the lot. The coming cold weather had stripped it of its leaves, and the heat of the fire had scorched the bark in several places. Muh walked with Maggie to that tree.

"Here," she said, "is what I wanted to show you."

Maggie looked at Glenn over her shoulder. He stayed a few feet away, watching from what he considered a safe distance. He could see on her face that she was miserable, but for whatever reason, and it was most probably respect for the sheer age of the woman in front of her, she was attempting to hold it together.

"It's a stupid dead tree," Maggie mumbled. She sounded almost disappointed, and Glenn wondered what Muh had promised her before showing her the dead little scrub tree.

Muh looked at the tree a moment, like she was really considering it and considering what Maggie said.

"Is it?" Muh asked. "Is that what you see, child?"

Maggie nodded, her arms crossed across her chest. Muh looked up at her for a moment. She nodded. She sighed and reached in the folds of her dress. She came out with a tiny pocket knife, not big enough hardly to be good for anything. She unfolded the blade and sliced a small piece of bark off the tiny tree.

"Now what do you see?" Muh asked, folding the knife up in her hands.

Maggie looked at it and shrugged.

"You see? The tree is not dead," Muh said. "And it isn't stupid," she said with a chuckle. "It has no brain, so it can be neither clever nor dull. It does have a spirit, though, like all living things. The life is there, but the tree has buried it down for a season. In the spring, the life will show again."

Maggie brushed at her hair with her fingertips. Her sour expression not changing as she stared at the woman.

"All the people of the world," Muh said, "are just the same as branches on this little tree."

She traced her hand up the small trunk of tree, running her finger over the spot where she had cut the bark off. She stopped it at the part where the tree began to branch off.

"Each of us goes our own way, and we grow the way that we are meant to grow. Some of our paths are long and straight," she said, "while others are crooked by nature. Some are short…" she traced her fingers across various branches as she spoke, not looking at Maggie any longer, but carefully considering the little tree.

"That's fine for the stupid tree," Maggie said suddenly, "but we're talking about people. Beth was just a kid! She didn't even get to live her life and the only reason she's dead is because some assholes shot her!"

Glenn backed up a little, not expecting Maggie's sudden outburst, followed by tears. The little woman put her hand on Maggie's arm. She broke a piece of the charred tree off in her hand and crumbled it, holding it up to Maggie.

"And sometimes there is tragedy of another's doing," the old woman said. "But still the other branches continue on their own paths because that is all they know to do. Your heart is heavy, but you must celebrate her life, and you must carry on with your own. She is on another journey now. She won't turn back. You can't stop your own to go with her. Even if you were to pass on now, your journey and her journey wouldn't be the same. It never was, and it never will be."

"I don't want to celebrate her life," Maggie said. "I want her to still be living it."

Muh shook her head.

"It is fine to want for things that cannot be, so long as you understand that you desire something you'll never have. Her journey is finished. If you truly loved her, then you still have all of her that you ever had. We can never do more in life than share our love with others. You possess nothing more of those you care about than the print they leave on you. The print is never gone, no matter how far away they go," Muh squeezed Maggie's arm again. "If you must mourn her, then do so, but know that mourning is the most selfish act that we can do. Don't soil her memory by allowing your mourning to take you away from your own life and then blaming it on her."

"So you're saying that I'm selfish because I don't think my sister should have died?" Maggie said. "I'm selfish because I'm tired of losing everyone that I care about?"

Muh shook her head.

"To love is not selfish, and naturally we are saddened when we can no longer see something we love. To let your mourning overtake you in the name of your sister, that is selfish. Don't dishonor your sister in such a way," Muh said. "You must continue to love her, and you must continue your life. Along your journey, if you are lucky enough to walk for many miles, you will love so many times…"

Muh stopped a moment and smiled at Maggie, rubbing her arm now.

"You will love so many, many times…and you will lose sight of those you love so many times as well…the pain and the happiness, they are signs of a journey well-travelled," Muh said.

Maggie wiped at her eyes, but the tears kept falling. Muh reached up and pulled Maggie's face toward her, and hiking up the bottom of her skirt, she wiped at Maggie's eyes and nose.

"Did you lose your family?" Maggie asked.

Muh shook her head.

"I have lost sight of them. I'm old and my eyes don't see as far as their roads go, but I haven't lost anyone. I know right where they are. I have been lucky to love so many…and maybe I will even love more in my days. There will be much to celebrate when my death day comes," Muh said. "So very much to celebrate."

Muh turned to Glenn then, and Glenn watched her as she stepped toward him.

"So she is your woman?" Muh asked.

Glenn looked at Maggie and back at the old woman.

"Maggie's my wife," he said. Muh nodded at him and squeezed his arm then.

"You are her helpmate then," Muh said. "You do not always have to have the answer for her, and she will not have it for you. The important part is never the answer to the problem. The important part is how you arrived at the answer. If she must mourn, for her own reasons, let her do so, but don't forget to remind her that her mourning must be temporary because there is much to be done and much to be seen and it is hard to see with eyes that you force shut."

Glenn felt confused, there was no other way to explain it. On the one hand he felt like he understood Muh, but on the other he felt like he didn't have a clue what to do about the situation, not any more than he had before. The only thing that he could say had really come out of the encounter was that Maggie was crying again, which she had given up doing when she fell into her silence, and she was speaking again.

When the little old woman walked away without saying anything else, Glenn stepped forward to where Maggie was sobbing, fingering one of the thin branches of the tree.

He pulled her to him, and she sobbed into his chest while he stood there, rubbing her back. He didn't know what to do to help her, but he was willing to be there for her until they figured it out, or until she had finally made peace with what had happened.

After Maggie sobbed for a bit, she started to quiet and Glenn wrapped his arm around her, leading her back toward the house. They crossed the path of Tyreese who was emerging from their house, looking much lighter than he had in the past few days.

"Maggie alright?" Tyreese asked to Glenn.

Glenn stopped a moment and Maggie continued on toward their house, still sobbing a little.

"Muh talked to her," Glenn said.

"What did she say?" Tyreese asked.

Glenn shrugged.

"I really don't know. I feel like I just met a human Rubik's cube," Glenn said.

Tyreese smiled and clapped him on the shoulder.

"I know that feeling," he said, "but I don't care what the little crone says…it seems to help, even if you don't understand it."

"I hope so," Glenn said, unsure still of what to do about Maggie. "How's Carol?"

Tyreese smiled again.

"She's tired, and she's sore, but she's perking up. When she sleeps now, it's voluntary," Tyreese said.

"I'm happy for you," Glenn said.

"Maggie will come around," Tyreese said. "Just give her time."

Glenn nodded and took his leave of Tyreese, headed back toward his house.


	110. Chapter 110

"Jeremiah will be here soon," Muh said. She wrapped the moth eaten horse blanket around the quiet girl beside her and waited by the fence.

Michonne had offered to accompany Daryl to see the old woman and the girl off when Jeremiah arrived. The morning had already been eventful, even though the sun was barely beginning to crest over the horizon. They'd all gathered early, at Daryl's request, to meet about whether or not the community would accept Muh's offer to return and stay with them until the next winter when she repeatedly stated she would die.

The community had unanimously voted that the woman and the silent girl be granted to stay if she wished. Muh had made rounds during the three days she had been there and spent time with each and every member, tending to just about any kind of ailment or concern that could be addressed. She'd made no miraculous changes in anything, yet something about her had changed nearly everything.

"We could give ya more clothes," Daryl said. Michonne nodded. They had more than enough to offer everyone at the other camp more garments than the rags they seemed to have at the moment.

Muh looked at him and studied her clothing for a moment. She shook her head.

"There will be time for gifts," she said. "For now we shall wait for Jeremiah. I have much to do."

"You ain't asked us what we decided about your offer," Daryl said.

Muh shook her head.

"I know what you have decided, but if you wish to tell me then you may," she said.

Daryl looked at Michonne and Michonne smiled a little at him. She knew that Daryl was unsure about Muh. He didn't have anything against the woman, but Daryl was a man of evidence. He wanted to see some miracle that proved the woman to be more than just a tiny old woman who liked making drinks and poultices all day long.

Michonne wasn't entirely sure that she believed Muh to be magic, but she did believe that the old woman was wise. Whether she had any secret teachings that way, or whether she'd simply paid attention as the years clicked by for her, Muh had collected a lot of information about the world and the ways of the people in it. She was happy to have whatever wisdom the woman could bring to the community. They were all pretty smart, especially as a whole, but that didn't mean that there wasn't a lot to learn.

"We decided you could stay," Daryl said. "In fact, if you don't wanta go with Jeremiah now you can just keep on stayin' here. You an' Haralee."

Muh nodded.

"I will come back," she said. "I must go. Agaliha's baby will come and Uwa will need me. While I am gone, Uwa's death day shall come and I will celebrate her life with the others. When the celebration is done, I shall return."

Michonne decided, then, that she would try to collect some clothes at least to send back with Jeremiah when he came to bring Muh and Haralee back. Even though she imagined that Muh travelled to their community by her own free will, she thought they should offer them something useful if they were taking the woman away from them.

"Why's this Uwa gonna die?" Daryl asked.

Muh smiled at him.

"It is time for Uwa to start another journey," Muh said. "She is very happy. Her journey here has been long and it has been a happy one, but she is excited about the one to come. She will like for me to celebrate with them after we have welcomed the little one that is her spirit child."

"What's a spirit child?" Daryl asked.

Michonne had to admit that she was curious. Muh, if for nothing else, was good for entertainment. She had a number of beliefs that Michonne couldn't quite put her finger on. They seemed to come from a variety of backgrounds. It was as if the woman had passed through her life collecting up pieces of belief systems. Some she kept and others she seemed to toss away until she'd made a collection that was uniquely hers.

"The child is the last that she will deliver," Muh said. "She will offer the child a piece of her spirit, and the child will carry her spirit with it throughout its journey. Then Uwa will pass to start another. There are many who have spirit children. Isaac will be my spirit child and he will teach me when it is time for me to start my new journey as well."

Daryl looked at Michonne and she almost laughed. He looked confused and like he wanted her to clarify things, but she really didn't have any answers for him. What Muh said was what Muh meant, whether or not it made much sense. If she believed in spirit children, then who was Michonne to question her belief?

When they saw Jeremiah in the distance, he was walking with another young black man. Muh smiled at the sight of them.

"Leland has come to see his Muh back," Muh said.

Michonne recognized the name of Leland. She'd heard Daryl mention it and she'd heard Muh mention it once when she was addressing Beau about something. She'd made some kind of confusing comparison between the boys, but not knowing Leland meant that Michonne didn't know if the comparison had been accurate in the slightest.

"Osiyo, Muh!" Leland called.

"Osiyo!" Muh called back. She grinned. Michonne and Daryl swung open the gates and to Michonne's surprise it was Muh who reached out before the two of them and put the one lone Walker down that had been pawing at them through the bars.

Without seeming to pay attention to anything else, Muh wandered out of the gates and kneeled down next to the Walker that she had just put down, touching its forehead where the knife she apparently kept somewhat concealed at her side had penetrated the Walker's rotting skull. She mumbled something, but Michonne couldn't understand it. The confusion on her face, or either that on Daryl's face, wasn't missed by neither Jeremiah nor the boy, Leland.

Jeremiah chuckled a little, but it was Leland who addressed them, glancing in Muh's direction.

"She's wishing him peace and a good journey," Leland said, nonchalantly. "She always does that when she grants one of the Dead peace."

Daryl eyed her as Muh stood up, turning back to them.

Michonne glanced around, making sure there were no more Walkers threatening to try to come in, since they were there with the gates open, but there weren't any to be seen. The weather was likely the cause for their dwindling numbers.

"Must play hell in a herd," Daryl said, "if she feels like she gotta talk to all of 'em."

It was Leland's turn to chuckle then. He reached out and put his arm around the shoulders of the little old woman. Michonne examined him a moment. He was a handsome young man, probably around Beau's age, which was likely what had brought Muh to make a comparison between the two. His chest muscles were very tone, and all the more visible for his lack of a shirt. Michonne hoped to be able to find something for him. She was chilled a little and more than covered, so she knew the boy had to be at least a little cold.

"The Dead don't bother Muh," Leland said. "They don't bunch up on her like they tend to do sometimes. She says it's because they waiting for her to give them peace and so they're patient."

"Whatever the reason," Jeremiah said, "it's true that they don't bother her much."

They all stood there quietly for a moment and Michonne couldn't help but feel like it was a bit awkward. It had been a long time since any of them had exactly been social with anyone else. For the most part when they encountered people it was a frightening situation. They had to assess the danger and then they'd always simply moved either straight to killing the people if they were dangerous or welcoming them into the community if they weren't. It was odd to feel like you were visiting with someone that you didn't know well but you had no intention to kill or live with.

"I would like for us to have that meeting," Jeremiah said to Daryl. "Talk about how our groups could work together. We were bothered a little two nights ago by a passing group. They didn't hurt anyone, but they did harass my wife a little. You might be on the lookout for them if they haven't already moved on."

Daryl nodded.

"How 'bout when ya bring Muh back? We can sit down then. You can bring whoever you want with you an' we'll talk about it all," Daryl said.

"We've got a lot of extra clothes here," Michonne said. "You're more than welcome to them. I know it's getting cold and you don't want your group freezing to death."

Jeremiah smiled at her and she thought he had a very nice smile. He seemed to be a very sincere man, and those seemed to be a little difficult to come by since the world had come crashing down around them.

"We'd appreciate that," Jeremiah said. "We've tried to keep to ourselves as much as possible and we've tried to take nothing more than what we've had to have to survive. Several of our group members are very against thievery, even if it seems that what we might take doesn't belong to anyone anymore."

"Well, we've laid claim to what we got," Daryl said. "And there ain't been a soul to dispute it, so I reckon it's ours to give if we want."

Jeremiah thanked Daryl and then turned his attention to the rest of his travel companions.

"Are you ready to go?" He asked Muh.

Muh nodded and without a word started forward, Haralee following close behind her and Leland walking with his arm around her shoulder. Jeremiah waved and called a farewell and Michonne and Daryl pulled the gates back closed, locking them.

"Ya reckon she's comin' back?" Daryl asked.

Michonne shrugged.

"She'll be back," Michonne said. "Remember, her spirit child's going to be here. She's got to come and get it."

Daryl smiled.

"Ya put any stock into what she says?" He asked.

Michonne thought about it. She really didn't know. She didn't know how to answer that question entirely. She wasn't positive if she actually believed what Muh said, or if she wanted to believe what the woman said.

"I think I do," she said finally. "Even if she's lying, she does it well."

"Ya reckon she's really gonna die when next winter gets here?" Daryl asked.

"I guess if she's of a mind to die, Daryl, then she'll die. She seems pretty excited about it," Michonne said.

Daryl nodded.

"There's that too," he said. "Seems awful strange to be so excited 'bout dyin'."

Michonne reached out and put her arm around Daryl. He looped his around her and they both started walking back toward headquarters to figure out what they were both doing for the day.

"I guess it's better to be excited about dying than to be afraid of it," Michonne said. "We're all going to do it. It's better for it to be something you look forward to instead of something that you dread."

"I reckon ya right, 'Chonne," Daryl said.

1111111111111111111111111111111111111111111

Sadie wasn't surprised when Rick showed up while she was working in the barn. He had a tendency to try to work with her whenever she was down there. He said he preferred the demolition and clean up to some of the other tasks that people had picked up here and there, but she had the feeling that it was more that he was always dancing around her, trying to figure out how to start a conversation.

Rick was very handsome. There was no doubt about that. Had Sadie been younger and more prone to schoolgirl crushes, she might have given into Rick a long time ago.

The difference was that she wasn't that simple girl that she had once been that let her head be turned by just a pretty face. She'd let her head be turned too many times, honestly, when she was younger. Her husband had pulled her out of that lifestyle.

Her husband had been a handsome man too, but more ruggedly handsome perhaps than Rick. He'd swept her off her feet. She wasn't looking for that anymore either, though.

Rick was persistent, she had to give him credit on that. He seemed genuinely interested, at least now, in talking to her and trying to get to know her. She'd been difficult on purpose. Losing his wife had obviously taken a toll on him, and she didn't suspect it would ever be anything that he would "get over". She no more expected that than she expected to wake up one day and forget the wonderful marriage that she'd had to her husband, the beautiful children that they'd had together, or the pain she'd felt at losing all of that. Your past was something that was behind you, but it wasn't forgotten.

Rick seemed to be coping better, though, from what she could tell. He was happier now than he'd seemed when she'd joined the group. He seemed to spend far less time seeped in the anger that she'd seen on his face so often when she'd first arrived.

She had wanted to be sure, though, with his apparently short lived and one track relationship with Rachel, that Rick hadn't seen her as something to simply trade out for Rachel. She didn't want to be some shiny new play thing for him. She was too old for that and life, especially now, was too short and unpredictable for such things if that wasn't what you wanted.

Rick had children. He had Carl, who was really less of a child and more of young man. Carl was polite and Sadie enjoyed being around him. She thought that he'd grow into quite the gentleman, given the chance. Carl spent much of his time these days following around behind Beau, and Sadie assumed it was because Beau was closer in age to the boy than the older men, and he had the patience to tolerate the shadowing. She reasoned, of course, that Carl could do much worse than think of Beau as a good role model. Beau was quite the young man, and any lessons that he could teach Carl would suit him well.

Rick also had Judith, though that relationship was not and never would be a true parent and child relationship. Rick was trying to spend some time with Judith, and the girl seemed to like him, but Sadie could tell that to Judith Rick was nothing more than just another male in her life. She thought, though, that it wasn't that great of a tragedy. Clearly family dynamics had changed a good deal since they'd first become aware of the crisis that had swallowed up life as they had known it.

Sadie wanted to give Rick credit for all that he'd seemed to achieve in the time that she knew him. She didn't know what he was like before all of this, but she thought that he was maybe returning to who he used to be, at least to some degree.

She also knew that for however much he may seem to want to start some kind of relationship with her, he wasn't pushing it. He'd kissed her the morning that he realized she wasn't going to die, and she'd kissed him too.

Since then, however, he had made no move to kiss her again. She appreciated that he seemed to be respecting her wishes to take things slow, though he occasionally teased her about them. She wasn't looking for some kind of epic romance, but she was beginning to think that she could appreciate something with Rick. They were already developing a friendship, and she wasn't sure if she wouldn't appreciate a little more.

So when Rick came up behind her, tapping her politely on the shoulder to alert her of his presence, and started helping to gather up the scraps that needed to be taken out of the barn area and put them into the wheelbarrow she'd rolled up the ramp that had been built, Sadie wondered how Rick would react to another kiss.

She didn't kiss him immediately. She tried to figure out what would be the best way to go about things. He had settled, for the moment, into the steady act of loading scraps and wasn't actually paying her any attention.

"Rick," Sadie called.

Rick looked up, still bent over to pick up some wood off the ground.

"What?" He asked.

Sadie sighed and realized that if anything were going to happen at this point, she was going to be the one to give the OK as well as the one to initiate the act.

"Come here," she said.

Rick finished collecting up what he was cleaning up and dropped it into the wheelbarrow. He dusted his hands off and walked over to where she was standing. Sadie slipped the safety goggles she always wore off her face and held them in her hands for the moment.

"Something wrong?" Rick asked.

Sadie sighed and reached up, hooking her hand on the back of his neck and pulling him to her. He hesitated at first, clearly not expecting the action, and then sank down, bringing his lips to hers.

She enjoyed the kiss and she held him there with her hand firmly on his head until she'd had her fill of his mouth, allowing his tongue to pass into hers. When she was done, she broke the kiss and removed her hand from his head, pulling away from him. He was staring at her, the corner of his mouth turned up slightly. She could tell that he was surprised, and probably wasn't sure quite how to react.

"That was nice," Rick said.

Sadie nodded at him. She wondered if he would try anything else or if he'd kiss her himself. Rick stood there, awkwardly, obviously not knowing how to proceed. Finally, he shifted forward and brought his lips back to hers, sinking into another kiss. This time she felt his hands go to her waist, just at her ribcage and hold her steady as though she might have thought of running away from him after she'd been the one to start this game.

Sadie felt Rick pushing her, and she broke the kiss long enough to look around to see where he was guiding her. She didn't particularly want to trip and break something in the barn and have to explain that they were supposed to be working but had decided to make out like teenagers instead. He continued to push her until her back came to rest against one of the walls. She looked back at him and smiled. His lip still curled much like it had earlier.

"So now you're letting me kiss you?" Rick asked.

"Yeah," she said, smiling. He broadened his smile in response.

"Why?" He asked.

Sadie did her best to give him the poutiest expression that she could muster.

"You don't want to kiss me?" She asked. He smiled again and shook his head.

"No, no…I want to kiss you, but you've been…" he trailed off and looked away. Sadie thought he might have said something and she reached her hand up, catching his cheek and turning his face back to meet her gaze. "You've been a little difficult, you know."

Sadie smiled at him again.

"Nothing worth having is easy," she said.

Rick shook his head and narrowed his eyes at her.

"So what are you trying to say?" Rick asked. "What exactly is going on here? I mean am I only allowed to kiss you? I feel like I've got to ask permission for everything."

Sadie felt her mind swimming. Rick was very much on the verge of overthinking everything for the moment.

Rick smiled and kissed her again. She leaned her head back against the wall that was behind her and enjoyed the feel of him of kissing her, his body close to hers.

They stayed that way for a little while. The kisses passing back and forth between them. Eventually Rick moved to kissing her neck and nipping at her earlobes, but he hadn't gone any farther than that, and she hadn't asked him to or led him in any given direction.

Finally, her lips sore from the kissing and her body yearning for more than she would allow it to have at the moment, Sadie had stopped the make out session. She'd left Rick with a soft kiss to contrast many of the others, and reminded him that there was work to be done and they'd have to answer for their time spent hiding in the barn away from others.

Rick simply nodded at her. He brought his hand up, gently brushing her cheek, and then he visibly sighed. She made a face at him to try to keep him from pouting over the end of it all, and winked at him hoping that he could at least gather that she hoped it wasn't the last kiss that they would share. He'd smiled a little at the wink and turned back to work.

Sadie pulled her goggles on and went back to work herself. She wasn't exactly _looking_ for romance with Rick…but she was beginning to be curious about what he might have to offer.


	111. Chapter 111

When Jeremiah returned with Muh and Haralee at least seven days later, he brought with him Leland, the woman he'd identified as Anissa, his wife, and another black man that was about the same stature as Jeremiah, although probably a little younger due to the fact that his hair was greying less than Jeremiah's. They'd been leading a Jack that was short and stocky and obviously got more than enough grass to feed on despite the small area it appeared they had been living in.

Jimmy and Carl had been watching the gates the morning when they arrived and they let them in, immediately recognizing the faces of Jeremiah, Muh, and Haralee. They tied the Jack just inside the fence and he immediately made good use of the length of his ties to begin trimming the nearby grass with his teeth.

Daryl called together anyone who wished to come to headquarters. He invited Jeremiah and his people into the living area of the house that replaced their old headquarters and offered them the best seats, attempting to be as hospitable as their new life allowed. Together they waited, practically in silence, for everyone who was coming to assemble.

"You have quite the group here," Jeremiah said, looking over everyone. Daryl was surprised, himself, at the turnout. Libby and Beau had gone so far as to bring Jacob and Sam out of hiding, though Libby still tried to keep the boys inside a good deal of the time. Tyreese had brought Carol over, with the assistance of Beau, and Jeremiah had offered his seat to her, seeing that she clearly wasn't going to be able to stand a meeting of any length of time if she had to remain standing in a corner somewhere. To Daryl's surprise, even Maggie had come down and leaned against a wall with Stella to see the members of this new group. The only person that Daryl could see that wasn't there was Sadie, and he had an itchy suspicion that she might be working in the barn alone and had never had any clue that anything was taking place.

"We missin' one," Daryl said. "She might wanta be here too…" Daryl shot a look at Rick who had obviously been turning over ground in the fields. He got up, apparently realizing that Sadie was absent, and disappeared without saying anything. "She gon' make it here, though. She don't always know what's goin' on."

"Slow witted?" Jeremiah asked, matter of factly. Daryl shook his head.

"Deaf. Can't hear nothin' so she misses the bells if they ain't no one around to clue her in," Daryl responded.

Jeremiah nodded knowingly.

Michonne and Rachel had both carried in a couple of bags that they'd gotten together with clothes in them. They offered the bags to Jeremiah with a smile.

"We weren't sure on sizes," Michonne said, "but there's a lot there, so hopefully some of it will work."

"We appreciate it," Jeremiah said. "Tala is handy with a needle and thread. I'm sure that she can make nearly anything work for our purposes."

"Tala?" Daryl asked.

It was the other man's turn to speak.

"Tala is Uwa's sister," the man said.

"This is George," Jeremiah offered. "He's one of the other men in our group."

Daryl nodded at the man in greeting and George waved at the people crowded into the room. Daryl noticed Rick and Sadie slip inside and bunch in a corner. They were going to have explain most of what happened to Sadie later. Michonne wasn't close enough to her to write the whole thing down.

"Did Uwa live?" Daryl asked.

"Yes," Muh answered suddenly. "Uwa lived more than many have ever lived. Her journey was good. We have wished that the next be even half as good."

"Uwa passed on," the boy, Leland, offered.

Daryl nodded. He wasn't sure what to say. Normally he would have said that he was sorry to hear of this Uwa's death, but he had an odd feeling that Muh might take his head off if he said something like that. He just nodded in response, not really feeling anything else was appropriate.

"So Jeremiah says that you're going to be taking our Muh away from us," George said. "We're sorry to see Muh go, but she makes her own decisions. We plan to move on in the spring and Muh doesn't wish to move with us."

Daryl nodded.

"If she wants to stay with us," he said, "we've all decided that she can stay. We don't have no concrete plan for moving on yet. We're playin' it by ear."

"You will move on," Muh said, "in the spring that follows my death day."

Daryl regarded her, truly unsure of whether or not he should just give up and believe her. She'd called this Uwa's death, but then again he wasn't positive how sickly Uwa had been. He could have called the death of quite a few people in his life, so it might not have been much of a challenge.

"Of course," Michonne said, "it's not like we would deny you any rights to visit Muh or try to keep her from visiting you. Not at all. If Muh chooses to stay with our group she stays as just a much a free member as anyone else here."

George nodded.

"We hope that Muh will visit us. She's welcome with our group any time that she pleases to come, and Haralee as well. Muh had already told us that she planned to stay, alone with Haralee, when we left in the spring, so we're really glad that she's found a group to stay with," George said.

"As for working together now," Jeremiah said, "I'm not sure that our group has much to offer. We have a few good fighters and we aren't afraid to fight if our backs are to the wall, but we don't set out to make trouble. We've tried to live as peacefully as possible."

Daryl nodded.

"I ain't gon' say we ain't had our share of fights," Daryl said, "but we'd like the idea of living in peace if it was possible. We been in a few tight spots, though, and once or twice we took the way out of goin' after them 'fore they come after us."

Jeremiah nodded.

"I think we can agree that it would be futile to judge each other for our ways of life. We all do what we have to do to survive," he said.

"That we do," Daryl said.

"You've had contact with other groups, though?" Rick asked. "Peaceful contact?"

Jeremiah and George looked at each other. George finally spoke, but looked hesitant to say what he was going to say.

"Yes and no," George said. "We've had a lot of contact with others since the beginning. Our group has taken in and lost so many members that hardly a single one of us started out with the other. Around here the contact has been more limited than in some of the other areas that we've passed through. There is a decent amount of foot traffic through our area, but the squatters don't stay long. Many of them are small groups and they're easy to get along with. They're looking to rest a day or two and get on their way, simple as that. There are others, though, that have tried to start problems."

"Like the ones that attacked us both," Rick offered.

"Like them," Jeremiah said. "There have been others too. They're mostly bandits. They're too lazy to work for anything so they just keep moving and take what they want."

"If we worked together we could be pretty good back up for one another," Rick said. "We've got fighters. Some are better than others, of course, but everyone goes in when they're needed."

"We do some trading with another pretty peaceful group a few miles from us," George said. "They're a decent sized group. They only intend to stay until spring as well. They say they're headed to Mississippi, but I don't know why that's their destination. They want to travel with us."

"If we was ta all come together," Daryl said, "we could have us quite a force. We wouldn't have ta worry 'bout fightin' with each other for nothin', but we could be right near unstoppable against any lil' rag tag bunch of bandits as you call 'em."

"What do you propose, though?" Jeremiah asked. "There's a good three miles between our group and your group. The other group is a good three miles in the opposite direction. Communication between us is pretty limited."

Daryl nodded his understanding.

"How do you normally communicate with the other group?" Daryl asked.

"About every week to fourteen days one of us passes by their camp or they come to ours," Jeremiah said. "We do whatever business might need to be done and we catch each other up on the status of other groups passing through. More or likely to settle soon, especially with the cold coming. Even the people who stay on the move try to hunker down for winter."

"Like bears," Daryl said. "We hibernate to keep our asses from freezing."

"Literally and figuratively," George said. A few people in the room chuckled.

"So we set up a similar schedule, then?" Daryl asked. "We keep in check with y'all and y'all keep in check with us an' we got a chance then to figure out if we gon' have trouble from any people around us."

Jeremiah shrugged.

"Fine with me," he said. "We have two Jacks and a Jenny at our camp. The other group has a hinny they get around on. We can move pretty quick if we need help in a hurry. Leland's our runner and they have a boy, Finn, that does the running for them. He's a brown headed boy white boy, all dusted with freckles. He hasn't grown into his elbows and knees yet. You'd know if him you saw him."

"Beau there's got him a mule. He an' Libby both can get that old thing hoppin' when they want," Daryl said. "Both a' them could run for us if we had some kinda big emergency."

"Mules are good stock," George said. "The other group has a pretty ragged chestnut mare they found, but we're trying to get our ass to cover her. Best to breed what we can off of her. We're hoping to coax her throw us a mule before we leave in the spring if we can get her to breed. They said we could have it as payment for some healing that Muh did and Muh offered to let us keep it for our travels if it's weaned on time. If it isn't, we'd gladly pass the payment to you, since you'll be keeping up with Muh and Haralee and all."

"Hopefully you'll get one to take with you," Daryl said. "I never thought that the old mule was really worth much."

Jeremiah chuckled.

"Worth more than a horse, I can tell you that. Right now about all a horse is worth is determined by if can live long enough to breed some mules or hinnies. Horses are harder to maintain, especially these days," Jeremiah said.

"Told ya we ain't need ta eat Blue," Beau said. Daryl shot him a look, but Beau didn't seem to care. He was grinning ear to ear at the confirmation that his pet was more useful alive than he might be in the pot.

"Well if they that handy then we'd gladly take your offer, presumin' that you can't take the mule with you when you head outta here," Daryl said.

Both Jeremiah and George somewhat nodded.

"We could maybe bring a representative or two from each group together," Rick said, "someone with everyone's interests in mind. Then we could all negotiate with or work with or whatever any new groups we come across. If we show them we're a united front, they may be less likely to try to attack anyone for fear of retaliation from all the groups."

"A council," Muh said. Everyone looked at her, most of them had forgotten the old woman was there and certainly hadn't imagined she'd be listening to everything. "You want a council. And it is a good idea. You will choose the man to speak for your clan. Together they will decide what is best for everyone. There will be others who will come, but when they see that the council speaks for many people, they will understand that it is better to do no harm because their actions will only bring the harm back upon them. A council will be good."

"I could get behind a council of sorts," George said. "We could discuss it with the other group. Leland I could go out tomorrow and talk to them."

Daryl shrugged.

"Sounds good to me," he said. "Can't hurt to have backup. Push comes to shove and everyone gets too rowdy out there, we got some room left in here, but we ain't got the kind of provisions we need, not if we gon' stay as long as Muh here says we is."

"We're well stocked," Jeremiah said. "We've got a lot of food. We used two fields from a nearby farm to put up more food than we'll be able to eat. The other group had a good harvest too. We've been trading various canned goods for some time."

"And we've cured meat," George said. "Game's no good right now, but we've got enough to feed our group and then some through the winter."

Daryl looked at Rick and Rick shrugged at him. He only wished that he could know what Rick was thinking or what anyone in the room was thinking. They were all quiet, though, mostly there to see what would take place. A negotiation such as this was a first for their community.

"If ya weren't against it, then, might be better just to try an' build a big group. We might have to bunch up more than we is, dependin' on how many people come in, but it ain't nothin' we ain't done before," Daryl said.

He glanced nervously around the room searching for anyone who might protest his single handed decision to invite one group, and possibly two, to share their space.

"We thank you for the invitation," Jeremiah said, glancing at George, "but for the time we'll decline. I can't speak for the other group since we haven't had the chance to even tell them about you. Our group is settled and we're comfortable. Other than the loss of our cow, which may very well end up being a greater loss than we thought, we should be fine."

"Well," Daryl said, "offer stands if ya should change your mind."

Jeremiah nodded.

"We don't know what the future holds for us, we may change it later on, but for now I think it's best if we work together to form the council we've planned," Jeremiah said. "Then, if push comes to shove, we can see about building a more solid union among our groups."

"What happened to the cow?" Michonne asked.

"Group that attacked us got them too," Daryl said.

"Yeah, you told me about that," Michonne replied.

"They had 'em a cow and them people killed it," Daryl said.

"We didn't really have any great affection for the cow," Jeremiah said with a chuckle. "It's only that Agaliha gave birth a few days ago and we're afraid that she's not going to produce enough milk to feed the little thing what it needs."

Michonne chuckled.

"We can help you there too," she said. "We've got a cow, but she isn't quite up to producing much yet. She was a little too starved at first, but we're working on her. We've got some formula stockpiled, though, and if the baby needs milk than bring the woman here. I won't offer her out, but Sadie makes enough milk and then some for her baby and I pump and throw out plenty myself. The last thing that makes any sense around here is a baby going hungry."

"We'll have to find something to give you," Jeremiah said. "I don't feel right taking all these generous offers when we really don't have anything to offer that it doesn't seem like you already have enough of. We'll see what happens with the baby, and we'll let you know. In the meantime, is there anything that you can think of that we might be able to give you?"

"We've taken Muh from you," Tyreese said suddenly. "She's already helped a number from our group. For now, don't worry about it. We'll consider ourselves even."

Daryl nodded at him, agreeing. There wasn't anything that the group was exactly aching for at the moment. They could use numbers were things to end up in some kind of battle, but you couldn't ask people to hand over their group members to you and you couldn't obligate others to live with you. For now they thankfully had the food, water, and clothing that they needed. There was no need to be greedy. The time may very well come when they weren't so well provisioned, and then they might ask for help, but as long as they didn't need it, they weren't going to take it, and as long as they had it to give, they weren't going to deny anyone else what they might need.

The conversation continued on for a bit, much in the same grain. They tossed back and forth ideas about how they might breach contact with some of the other smaller groups that were in the area, either temporarily or long term. They discussed things that would be useful for the winter and what each of their groups had done to prepare. Then the talk turned lighter as they discussed their people and a few stories were shared about how everyone had come to know one another and how they had ended up here after everything had happened.

The other group, in Daryl's opinion, had come to be much like his own group. They weren't a family in the beginning, but they had picked up people here and they had picked up people there along the way. Some of their group had travelled from as far away as Virginia and others had joined fairly recently. They'd also lost their share of group members to everything from pneumonia to Walkers.

The other group was prepared, for the most part, to winter where they were. They had high hopes of moving on and going west. Daryl wasn't sure that there was really anything out west that they were going after, and neither were they, but for them it had become a goal. It was something to keep them going. Daryl understood their need for a set destination. It was only now that his own group had begun to once again discuss the possibility of considering, at least, a decided upon route for any further travelling that they did.

Eventually, though, it became time to say goodbye to their new friends. George and Jeremiah loaded the bags of clothing, along with a decent amount of dry formula, onto the back of the greedy ass that had eaten his fill of the grass that he could reach.

They all bid farewell to Muh and Haralee, and said goodbye to the group members that hovered near the gates to see them off, and then they left with Leland leading the ass.

Daryl stood near the gates, Michonne leaning against him somewhat, and watched until they'd disappeared from sight. When he'd turned, he realized they were the only two remaining. Everyone else had disappeared back to their tasks. The only people that he could see were Libby, Beau, and Carl, and the three of them were walking down the street carrying buckets.

"Goin' ta get water," Beau said to Daryl as he walked up to the gates and waited for Daryl to let them pass. Carl was apparently chosen to keep Walkers off of them because he only had one bucket and he stabbed the single Walker that was nearby. Daryl didn't imagine the run would cause much trouble today. Walkers weren't exactly stirring. The fences he could see from where he stood were almost entirely clear.

He and Michonne watched the three of them scurrying off toward the creek. He chuckled.

"What?" Michonne asked him.

"I was just thinkin', 'Chonne, that I don't even know what the hell to expect no more," Daryl said.

"What do you mean?" Michonne asked. She tugged at his arm and he started to follow her back toward their house. He knew that he needed to work on something. There was more than enough stuff to keep them all occupied, but he wasn't sure yet what he would dedicate his day to doing.

"I don't know, 'Chonne. The world sure is changin', ain't it? I mean we buildin' some kinda council with other groups we ain't even met ta keep our group safe from people we don't even know exists," Daryl said.

Michonne made a humming noise in her throat and Daryl turned to look at her. She tilted her head a little, obviously thinking.

"The world is changing, Daryl, but nothing that's happening is nothing that hasn't happened before. It all just keeps coming around. It would be so much nicer, though, to think that we could have some kind of order set in place. You know? Something where we all worked together and tried to live peacefully instead of worry about Governors coming through, or rapists, or even just murderers and thieves. It might be a long shot, but negotiating for peace sounds a lot better than all that," Michonne said.

"It does sound better, if it'll work," Daryl said.

"And I'm realistic enough to know that it might not," Michonne said. "But it isn't going to hurt us to give it a try."

"I'd like it if we could make it peaceful, 'Chonne," Daryl said. "I'd really like ta know that our kids ain't gotta grow up thinkin' that they gon' get killed in their sleep."

"We'll do the best we can then," Michonne said. "We've got a few years to get things in place for them, don't you think?"

Daryl smiled at her and rubbed his finger under her chin. She brought her lips to his and he pulled in closer, letting their tongues play together for a moment.

Daryl sighed when the kiss broke apart.

"I reckon I need to get down there to the field," he said. "Rick's tryin' ta get the whole thing turned over so it'll be fertilized when we're ready to plant in the spring.

Michonne smiled at him.

"All this talk about the future's kind of exciting," she said. "Why don't you let Rick handle the fields for just a bit longer?"

Daryl smiled then, seeing the mischief in Michonne's eyes.

"Yeah?" He asked. "You reckon he's gon' be alright down there alone?" He teased.

Michonne smiled at him and leaned in to kiss him again.

"I reckon he'll be just fine," she said, putting on a fake accent to tease him. "I think I need you to come with me for a little bit. There's other work to be done."

"What kinda work?" Daryl teased, letting Michonne pull him by the hand.

"Important work, Daryl, very important work. It won't take long…you'll be back before people start wondering where we went," Michonne said.

"Well if it ain't gonna take long enough ta get people talkin' then how damn important can it be, 'Chonne?" Daryl asked.

"Oh, it's important," Michonne said. "And it's important that we do it right now…while we're busy thinking about the future and our children…and while Hope is with her uncle Mark."

Daryl chuckled.

"Right behind ya," he said, following Michonne up the steps to their house.


	112. Chapter 112

Slowly the days seemed to be shorter. The winter closed in around the community slowly, but surely, chilling everything. Much of the outside work that still remained to be done was being finished with as much attempt to hurry as possible. They were trying to beat time, but time was beating them. That was always the funny thing about time. No matter how much the world around them seemed to change, one thing always remained the same, there was never enough time.

Jeremiah came calling one day at the gates, riding along on the same ass he'd brought before, flanked by a man that they would later learn was named Jackson who was riding a rust colored hinny not much taller than the ass that Jeremiah dismounted at gates.

Jeremiah had come for two purposes. He had come to introduce the community to Jackson who would be representing the other group that Jeremiah's small clan was in contact with, and he was there to ask Muh if she would return to their community because several of the people had fallen ill without warning and they were afraid that the fresh chill in the air would kill them without her assistance.

Muh stood at the gates, working her jaws and listening to Jeremiah's description of what was wrong with the people in his group. Haralee, the faithful shadow that she was, stood only inches from Muh and listened from beneath the cloak that Muh had fashioned for her out of some of the clothes that she had found and thought weren't suiting.

"I shall go," she said. "But I shall not make promises that I cannot and will not keep. Old man winter brings with him the death days of many and blessed are those who end their journey in the winter, for it is the most proper time to say farewell."

Daryl stood by, worried by the whole situation. He'd already told Rick that when and if the council thing should be formed, he wasn't going to be stepping into the position as the speaker of the group. He had a son that would, according to Muh, be debuting at any time and he wanted to be there to welcome him. He wanted nothing taking him away from that. Rick had understood and offered himself to step into the role.

Now Muh was threatening to leave the community, and Daryl had no idea when she would be back. Though he knew that Carol and Mark had studied for this and were more than capable of brining his son into the world, there was something about the little old crone that made him think that somehow she could do it better, easier…he almost wished he had some authority by which to keep her there.

"What about the baby," Daryl asked. "What if he comes and ya ain't here?"

Muh smiled at him.

"I will be here," she said. "I will return before the child comes, but if you are fearful that I shall not deliver him, then it is a gentle ride for Beau to retrieve me. I should like to see how his old mule rides anyway. It is a fine animal."

Daryl nodded, chewing at his thumb.

He stood back and watched as Rick chatted with the Jackson fellow. Jeremiah, happy to hear that Muh was returning with them, helped her onto the back of the ass that he'd been riding.

"I shall be leaving Haralee here," Muh said, directing her attention to Daryl simply because he was the only one paying her any attention. "This is the first of journeys that I shall take without her. I have not yet chosen who shall care for her in my final absence. Therefore, I leave her to you, son. She will not want for much, but kindness would dictate that you offer your home to her."

Daryl eyed Haralee and she eyed him. Neither spoke to the other. Daryl seldom spoke to the girl since she never spoke to anyone. He wasn't sure exactly what they would do with a ten year old girl in the house, but they would make do he supposed.

"Fine," Daryl said. "We'll watch her 'til you can get back."

"I will be back soon," Muh said. "Haralee will be good until my return."

Daryl didn't doubt the child would be good. She didn't speak and she didn't do much of anything except follow the old woman around and wait on her when she requested it. He hadn't seen much indication that the girl was capable of doing anything else.

Seeing that Muh was ready to go and Jeremiah was anxious, Rick took his leave of Jackson and he and Daryl watched as the small group left the community and disappeared in the direction of Jeremiah's clan.

"So Muh just left?" Rick asked.

Daryl glanced at Haralee.

"Yeah, said we gotta watch after the young'un," Daryl said. "Said she's gonna be back in time for the baby…and somethin' about winter and journeys, you know the drill."

Rick chuckled.

"The Jackson man seems pretty nice. He said there's something like a trade ring in place. Apparently a lot of the passing groups bring things with them that they don't need and trade them out for things they do. He also said that about eight miles from here there are at least three small groups camping. They say they're staying for just a short time, but he suspects they'll decide to stay until spring. He says they don't seem like threats, except that one group seems to be a little too anxious for female company and therefore it might be best to make sure that none of the women leave the community unattended, just in case this group gets ideas," Rick reported.

"Don't nobody go nowhere alone," Daryl said. "Not 'less it's me or maybe Beau or Libby, and they tend to go together wherever they got to go. Muh slips out when she pleases, but I don't reckon there's too many men taking a fancy to a woman old as she is."

Rick laughed.

"I told him that our women don't often go anywhere alone. Honestly I think some of them would be just as able to take care of themselves as they would be likely to be taken care of by one of us. Still, we might want to raise the concern, just to make sure that no one decides to start a new practice. Beau and Libby might want to be careful too," Rick said.

"You can bet'cha ass that ain't no man gonna tangle with Libby," Daryl said.

Rick laughed again and nodded.

The more that Libby snuck out of her shell, the more that it was evident that Libby was a lit firecracker. She seemed to think that any disagreement was better handled with her fists than with anything else. Beau had taken a shine to the girl, though, and seemed to know how to handle her, though Daryl had seen them go a few rounds here and there where it looked like Beau was really more interested in playing defense than anything else. Daryl wondered, from time to time, if there was something going on between the two, but he wasn't exactly sure that either of them knew what to do with it if there was.

11111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111 11111111

It had been exactly six days since Muh left. Daryl knew because he'd been keeping track of it, a little fearful that the woman wasn't going to return. Michonne was miserable more than she wasn't and she had trained Judith to rub her belly and repeat "baby come out please" any time that she found a place to sit or lie down. Hope tried to repeat the mantra along with Judith, but it was less understandable when she yelled it, since Hope was a point where she seemed to think that nearly everything she said needed to be said in the loudest voice her tiny body could manage.

Daryl came into his house rubbing his hands together from the chill outside and was met at the door by Hope who commanded that he pick her up. He did, and then he surveyed the zoo that was his living room. Michonne was on the couch with Carol and Judith was repeating her mantra over and over to Michonne's very swollen belly. Paul crawled around in the floor, having finally mastered backward but having yet to figure out exactly how to reverse gears.

Haralee sat quietly on the floor near Paul, dragging him back into the middle of the floor every time he hit some piece of furniture that served as a roadblock to his backward journeys.

And then Daryl figured out what Michonne and Carol were looking at. In all the living rooms there were fireplaces. None of them had been used as of yet. The houses had chimneys, but Carol had assumed from the time they moved in that all the fireplaces had mostly been for show given that there were very few houses that had any of the necessary tools that one would need to actually operate a burning fireplace. She also reasoned that the houses were clean and the brick in the fireplaces showed no signs of having housed burning fires. They had, therefore, almost forgotten about the fireplaces entirely, considering them nothing more than some wasted space or a place to sit in the living room of headquarters.

And now Daryl realized that Sadie was inside his fireplace. Or rather, part of Sadie was inside his fireplace. The rest of her spilled out onto the area around it. He stood, bouncing his daughter on his hip and staring at what could still be seen of the woman.

"She stuck?" He asked finally.

Michonne shook her head.

"We don't think so," Michonne said. "We didn't really think it through that well, though, and we realized that once she got her head in there we didn't have any way to really communicate with her, so now we're waiting."

"The fuck is she doin' in there anyway?" Daryl asked.

"Daryl," Carol scolded.

Daryl didn't respond. The women were always on him about his language in front of the children. Michonne argued that she didn't want Hope using profanity before she was even fully potty trained…or whatever you called it these days.

"She's trying to see if the fireplaces are actually functional," Michonne said. "Daryl, we're going to freeze to death this winter if we don't get some kind of heat. If it's this cold already you know it's going to get worse."

"But why the hell did ya put Sadie in there? Like ya said, she can't hear ya," Daryl said.

"She's the only one that would fit," Michonne argued. "I can't get in there and Muh doesn't even want Carol breathing in much of the cold air so I doubt she wants her going up a chimney."

"Go get Libby an' shove her up there," Daryl said. "She's skinny enough she could go to the top without getting stuck."

Daryl put Hope on the floor and walked over, tapping on Sadie's leg. She said something, but it was muffled by the fireplace. Daryl tapped on her leg again, a little rougher this time.

"Damn it," he said. "I can't even ask her if she's stuck 'cause she can't hear me."

He finally decide the woman was likely stuck and started to pull on her legs. He would have continued pulling if it hadn't been for her finally wrestling her arm out of the hole and swinging it at him while she yelled something that had the echoing resemblance to the word "stop." He quit pulling, sitting down where he was, and a few minutes later, she shimmied out of the hole.

She sat, for a moment, cracking her back and grimacing. Daryl didn't know how far up she'd tried to go, or what she'd encountered in there, but he didn't much imagine that he wanted to go up the inside of the chimney.

"It looks open," Sadie said, shrugging. "I think it will work."

"So now what?" Daryl asked.

Sadie shrugged at him a little.

"We try to build a fire. If it's open the smoke will go up," she said.

"And if it isn't?" Daryl asked. Sadie looked around the room.

"Everyone should go outside, just in case. The smoke will fill the house. We'll have to air it out," she said. "But, if it's open, that means that most of the houses are built the same way. We can keep fires going. We have to be careful with the babies."

"There were a few sets of fireplace tools in some of the houses," Michonne offered from the couch. "I know that we put a couple of them in the storage house just because we didn't know what to do with them. I don't know how many there are around, but we could get someone to see if there's enough for each house to have a set."

Daryl waved at her a little, pulling Hope into his lap to stop her from trying to climb up his back.

"We might be gettin' ahead of ourselves," he said. "I reckon we just need to go to storage an' get the one. Then we gotta test the damn thing out 'fore we decide we just gon' set all the houses up," Daryl said.

"Fine," Michonne said. "I don't care how you do it, Daryl, but it's cold and I don't want to freeze to death, so could you please get started on it?"

Daryl chuckled.

"Right this minute," he said. "I was hopin' that'cha was gonna find me somethin' to do."

He sat there for a moment, waiting to see if she'd respond, but she didn't. He sighed and pulled Hope up to him, kissing her neck and making her squeal.

"Dada 'tahp!" She commanded in her loud voice.

He smiled and put her down.

"I'ma get'cha later," he threatened. She was ticklish…very ticklish, but the funniest thing about her was that she simultaneously loved and hated to be tickled. Michonne didn't tickle her, saying it was some kind of torture, but she all but begged Daryl to tickle her.

Daryl pulled himself up to his feet and then he reached over and heaved Sadie to hers.

"Come on," he said. "Let's go see if we can't make this shit happen 'fore my wife builds a fire in the middle of the living room floor."

"Don't think we weren't discussing it," Michonne called after him as the two of them slipped out the door. Daryl chuckled and started down the steps with Sadie.

11111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111 1

On the eighth day after her departure, Muh returned to the community riding on the ass and being led by Jeremiah. Daryl heard Carl yelling about their arrival and almost dropped the armful of wood that he was carrying. In his mind, he had decided that the woman would come and her arrival would signal the consequent arrival of his son. It was only after a second that he reminded himself that it wasn't true, and that in any case the baby wouldn't be born instantly.

He at least had time to deliver a few more armfuls of wood to the houses, all of which now had chimneys that issued forth at least the occasional puff of smoke.

Muh's return to the community had everyone stirred up. In her short amount of time there, she'd become something of a mascot. Whether or not she was actively doing something, her very presence was something they all enjoyed and saw as promising of good days.

The woman brought with her, though, several things that they weren't expecting. She brought gifts, which Jeremiah said were her things and therefore she could give them as she pleased, and in her lap she brought, tied in a bundle, a small baby.

"Agaliha didn't make it," Jeremiah said. "Uwa was Agaliha's grandmother, and she had no other family left. We offered to keep the girl and adopt her out to one of our women, Anissa even said she would take her, but Muh insisted that the child come with her."

Daryl shrugged.

"We got a whole damn flock a young'uns," Daryl said. "Don't know what the hell another one's gonna hurt."

Jeremiah nodded at him.

"This winter isn't going to be easy," Jeremiah said. "We lost two and Jackson's group lost one. I hope your community isn't hit with problems. It's the old ones, the young ones, and the weak ones…those seem to be the ones dying."

"What'cha reckon it is?" Daryl asked.

Jeremiah shrugged.

"There's no telling. Could be something like pneumonia, but I'm no doctor," he said. "I'm going to head back now, but you send Beau if there's any trouble here and you need us. Leland can ride out for Jackson's group at any time."

Daryl nodded his OK at Jeremiah and the man left.

Muh was speaking to those who had gathered to welcome her back, handing out presents here and there. She turned to Daryl when she saw him.

"I said I would be back," she said. She smiled up at him.

"Reckon you was right," Daryl said.

Muh nodded. "There, that can that was tied to the ass…" she pointed and Daryl followed the direction of her pointing to a decent sized can that had a rope netted around it. "That is for your wife," she said. "It is for when the baby comes. Give it to her to have on that day."

"When ya reckon he's coming?" Daryl asked.

Muh squeezed his arm.

"He will be here before three days' time," she said. "I returned for him."

"And what'cha reckon ya gonna do with that one?" Daryl asked, pointing at the tiny baby she had tied around her.

"Walela is a gift," she said. "I am going to take her to her parents."

Daryl looked at the tiny baby he now knew was a girl. She was about the same color as Hope was when she was born, though Hope was a little darker now, and she had black hair. She seemed to be sleeping peacefully in the bundle that Muh had made for her.

"Who are her parents?" Daryl asked.

"The girl who mourns so the end of journeys," Muh said. "For Walela here journey so far has contained little more than the celebrations of the ends of others. Now she will teach the girl that the end for one is only the beginning for another. Walela is impatient, at times, and she will be good for showing the girl that she must not wait forever to accept that her journey continues. They will grow well together."

Daryl watched, then, as Muh walked off carrying the baby, Haralee trailing behind her carrying a piece of wood in each hand. Daryl shook his head, took the can he was to deliver to Michonne, and left the old woman to deliver the shock of a lifetime to whom he reasoned to be Glenn and Maggie.

11111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111 

"You got a present," Carol said to Michonne, putting the can down on the dresser in Michonne and Daryl's bedroom and sitting on the edge of the bed while Michonne paced between the room and the bathroom twisting her locks.

"What is it?" Michonne asked.

Carol chuckled softly. She was healing with leaps and bounds from her accident, but there were still a lot of actions that were obviously uncomfortable to her. Laughing was among them.

"Looks like grease, or oil of some kind," Carol said. "Doesn't smell bad, but apparently it's for when the baby comes."

Michonne stopped what she was doing a moment to look with question at Carol.

"Grease? For what?" Michonne asked.

"I don't know that," Carol said. "It's for you, or the baby, or both of you. That's Muh's doing."

Michonne went back to what she was doing, trying to figure out the little old woman and her ways.

"Well is she going to grease me? Or grease the baby? I mean what do we need grease for?" Michonne asked.

"I told you, Michonne, I don't know," Carol said.

She offered another one of her very light chuckles.

"Maybe she's going to grease the baby up and it'll just slide right out of there," Carol said.

Michonne shot her a look.

"That's not funny," Michonne said.

Carol snickered.

"It is funny, Michonne. I mean you have a can of grease…what else do you think she might do with it? She's going to make this real easy on you," Carol said.

"You're getting too much enjoyment out of this," Michonne said. "I'm glad you're feeling better, but really, you're getting too much enjoyment out of the whole thing. Out of me being huge and miserable, out of the whole birthing experience, and now you have a can of grease to entertain you."

"No, Michonne, you have a can of grease," Carol corrected.

Michonne rolled her eyes at her.

"That's fine, yuck it up now," Michonne said. "I'm remembering all of it. Every single joke and every single time you tease me about waddling. I'm storing it all up."

"Oooh, so vengeful," Carol teased. "I would think you'd be happy about the grease plan."

"Mmm hmmm," Michonne hummed. "Keep going. Make sure you get every last bit out, because when Isaac is on his way, I'm getting it all back, tenfold."

"Isaac, Isaac, Isaac," Carol said. "You're as bad as some of the others. You actually believe that old woman can predict the future, Michonne?"

"I don't know, Carol," Michonne said.

"I'm not pregnant," Carol said. "Not even close."

"You wouldn't be," Michonne said. "Not yet. Isaac's got to come right about the time that next winter comes. You've got some time. And I don't know if she can predict the future or not, but you keep teasing me and I'm going to lie awake at night and pray that this is one time she nails it."

"I hope this baby comes soon," Carol said, some of the humor having left her voice. "The bigger you get, and the closer it gets, the crabbier you get."

"And I'm remembering that one too," Michonne said, circling around to the bathroom again.


	113. Chapter 113

"We've got plenty of baby stuff and there's more powdered formula," Carol said to Maggie who was standing in front of her holding a squalling baby girl. "I know that Tyreese is going to find you a crib in one of the houses."

Carol almost laughed. The crying baby was pathetic enough but Maggie almost looked like she was going to cry right along with it.

"You don't understand," Maggie protested. "It won't stop! It's broken!"

Carol stifled a laugh. Her chest ached and she knew the laugh would make it worse. The smoke that filled all the houses now wasn't exactly making everything smooth sailing either. Now Maggie was in front of her in the living room and Carol didn't know where the rest of her household had disappeared to.

"Maggie, that baby is not broken. She's just a tiny little baby," Carol said. "She's probably hungry."

"And what am I supposed to feed her?" Maggie asked, her eyes wide.

"Give me the baby," Carol said, moving to sit on the couch. Maggie came over and gently put the baby in Carol's arms. Carol examined the angry child for a moment. She was very, very young, and she may have been a little underweight, but Carol wasn't positive. "Go down to headquarters and get some hot water. By the time you get back in the cold it should have cooled down enough."

Maggie nodded.

"Are you sure you're going to be alright?" Maggie asked. "I swear it never stops. It'll make you want to kill yourself."

Carol smiled.

"I can handle a screaming baby for a little while. Go and get the water," Carol said.

Maggie left and Carol teased the baby a little, offering it her knuckled to suck on. The poor thing was hungry because as soon as she put her finger into its mouth it latched down to suck on it for a moment before it realized that it had been fooled.

"It's OK," Carol cooed. "We're going to get you something to eat. Your Mama is new at this, but we've got enough old Mamas around here to pull her through."

She ignored the howling for the most part and waited until Maggie got back to instruct her on finding the old bottles and formula that were still tucked in the kitchen cabinets from when Hope and Judith had needed them.

Finally Maggie brought her a bottle.

"Do you want to feed her?" Carol asked.

Maggie sat down in one of the chairs, shaking her head adamantly. She put her elbows on her knees and cradled her head in her hands. Carol offered the baby the bottle and the little thing started sucking greedily, looking at Carol over the top of the bottle as though she were angry with her for all that she'd been through so far.

"It stopped! Thank God it stopped!" Maggie said.

"Shhh…don't be loud. She's trying to eat, she doesn't need you to be loud," Carol said.

"Carol that thing has been crying for like two hours and we've only had it for about two hours and three minutes," Maggie said. "And what kind of a name is Walela? I have a child…which in fact is not my child…and that child just happens to be named Walela? You can't do that, Carol, you can't just give people children like that."

Carol looked at Maggie, raising her eyebrows. Maggie huffed.

"Tell me you want this baby," Maggie said. "You look like you're really good at that."

"Maggie if you'd tried to feed her, you'd be really good at it," Carol said. "She's just hungry, and you can ask Muh about her name if you want to. You and Glenn were talking about having a baby if I remember correctly."

"Yeah," Maggie said. "We talked about it, a little. We kind of thought that, you know, we might have _our_ baby."

"Well would you look at this," Carol said, smiling. "It just so happens there's a brand new baby right here. Looks like a Rhee to me."

Maggie sighed again, running her fingers through her hair.

"Every Mama is terrified in the beginning," Carol said. "No matter where your baby comes from. You're going to be fine, though. Your instincts will kick in soon and you're going to find out that being a mother is one of the greatest things that will ever happen to you. You've got plenty of mothers around here to help you out too. A lot of new mommies can't say that."

Carol could see that Maggie was calming down, but she didn't know if it was owing to what she was saying or simply owing to the fact that the baby was quiet now.

"I don't know if I'm really ready for this, Carol," Maggie said. "I don't know if I'm ready and I don't know if Glenn is ready. We didn't wake up this morning thinking that we were going to be parents. We didn't have the same kind of warning that everyone else has had."

Carol smiled again, momentarily looking at the baby who was apparently beginning to think that a nap would be a great side to this meal.

"Do you think that I planned for Judith to happen the way she did?" Carol asked. "Or Sadie? Do you think that she knew that day that she'd come out of that school with Paul? Or look at Beau? He's practically become a daddy to those two boys that Libby has. I know he didn't see that coming."

Maggie nodded her head and took a breath.

"I'm just worried that I'm not ready for this. I mean you and Sadie, you had practice before. Beau might have to be a daddy, but it's different. I mean even Glenn…it doesn't feel like it's the same to him and we haven't even had this kid for a whole day," Maggie said.

"No matter how much practice you have, Maggie, and you remember this in case you ever do have children, each one is different. And no, it's not the same for Glenn. The difference is that you just became a mama, and being a mama and being a daddy are two different things. One day you'll feel sorry for Glenn because he'll never understand what it's like to be a mama, instead of feeling a little jealous because he might not be as stressed as you are right now."

"Are you sure you don't want her?" Maggie asked.

Carol smiled and shook her head.

"No, Maggie, I don't want your baby. Walela is your little one, and right now she's just about ready to be burped and then I think she's going to consider having a nice snuggle and a nap with you if you think you're ready for it," Carol said. "You can take her to your house, start settling in with her. Tyreese is already out there finding you a crib, so he might even beat you back. I'll get together diapers and things for you and get him to bring you a care package over."

Maggie got up and walked over, looking at the baby as Carol eased her up, leaning her over her hand and rubbing her back until she burped.

"Do you have a blanket?" Carol asked.

Maggie shook her head.

"OK, I'll make sure you get blankets too. You need to keep her bundled up. It's too cold for her little body to be outside without a blanket right now and swaddling her will make her feel safer. Go upstairs and get one of the blankets that's thrown over the side of that extra crib," Carol commanded.

When Maggie came back, holding the blanket out, Carol wrapped the baby in it.

"Here, now you take her," Carol said. Maggie eased the baby up and hugged her to her.

"She's going to sleep," Maggie whispered.

Carol smiled.

"I know," she whispered back. "Keep her close to you for a little while and try to stay calm. If you get upset then she'll get upset because she doesn't know what's happening. I'll make sure you get everything you need."

"Thank you," Maggie said, smiling for the first time since she'd shown up at the door. Carol nodded at her and watched as she started toward the door with the baby.

"Maggie," Carol said.

Maggie turned to look back at her over her shoulder.

"Congratulations," Carol said.

Maggie smiled a little and nodded, pulling the door open and letting herself out.

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Daryl first began to suspect something was going on when he saw Sadie leaving his house with Hope on her hip and leading Judith by the hand. She took the girls from time to time, but she appeared to be fully focused on what she was doing. Daryl was just coming up from having fed the animals, so he double stepped to the porch and mounted the steps there two at a time.

"Somethin' wrong?" He called out.

Carol came to the top of the steps.

"I don't want you to freak out, Daryl, but do you think you could go and round up Mark and Muh?" Carol asked.

"What's goin' on? Is the baby comin'?" Daryl called back.

"Yes, Daryl, the baby's coming, but it's not going to be here any time soon, so you can take your time. Go and get them, please. And could you tell Rachel that we're going to need hot water? I've got everything else already." Carol called back.

Daryl suddenly felt like his heart would explode it was beating so hard. They'd planned for this, somewhat rehearsed it, and he thought he wouldn't get overwhelmed, but right this moment he felt like it was too much to process. He wanted to run up the stairs and check on Michonne, but he wanted to find the others. In fact he just wanted them to already be there so he didn't have to run around trying to round them up when his baby was coming.

"'Chonne OK?" He called.

"Fine, Daryl, just go get the others," Carol called down.

Daryl turned as quickly as he could and charged out the door to round up everyone that was supposed to be involved in the birth.

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Daryl sat on the porch swing beside Tyreese, despite the cold, smoking a cigarette. He was grateful that Tyreese was willing to sit with him.

"They run me out again," Daryl said, "just like with Hope."

Tyreese chuckled.

"Hey man, sometimes it just happens that way," Tyreese said. "Carol said she come and get you when Michonne's ready to start pushing, though, so you're not missing the exciting part."

"What if she forgets to come and get me?" Daryl asked.

He was sulking. He knew he was sulking and he didn't care. He'd intended to be there for this birth, the whole thing. Beginning to end. He'd missed the beginning, though, and he'd had to round everyone up. Then Carol kept sending him on all these little errands to get this and get that. Finally they'd asked him to come and sit on the porch or sit in the living room if he thought he could stay down there. He'd come on the porch because sitting in the living room was driving him crazy because he could hear everything but see nothing.

"Carol is not going to forget to come and get you," Tyreese said. "Woman's got a memory like an elephant for anything she wants to remember. Now if she didn't want to remember it…then you might be in trouble."

"Said I asked too many questions," Daryl said, taking a drag off his cigarette.

Tyreese chuckled again.

"When my daughter was born," Tyreese said, "my _wife_ kept sending me out of the hospital room to go and get the most ridiculous things. It was probably my fifteenth trip to the car or the gift shop or the nurse's station before I realized that she was just running me out of the room and trying to be nice about instead of just telling me to go. It can be overwhelming. You want to help, but you really can't help."

"'Chonne tells me she's fine one minute and the next she's lookin' anything but fine but there ain't nothin' that nobody's doin' 'bout it," Daryl said. "I know they just gotta work their way out, but it seems like ya oughta be able to do somethin'."

Tyreese chuckled again and rocked the swing with his foot, shaking both of them.

"That's just nature, Daryl. Birth is a lot more exciting, I guess you could say, for the mother than it is for the father. Michonne's busy, but you're just out here holding down this rickety swing with me," Tyreese said. "You'll get to be in there in a little while, though, and then you get to do the hand holding and all that."

"Still don't feel like doin' much," Daryl said. "But at least it's better than nothin'."

"That's true," Tyreese said, "it's better than nothing."

111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111

Daryl thought that he didn't have to wait as long outside as he had with Hope. Finally they called him in and he rushed up the stairs, beating Mark who had come down by a few minutes. He bounded into the room, already knowing what to expect and waited rather impatiently for Rachel, who was sitting behind MIchonne and supporting her, to move so that he could get on the bed behind Michonne.

"I got'cha," he said, pulling Michonne up against his chest. He wrapped his arms around, trying to open himself up so that she could grab at whatever it was she wanted to hold onto. Carol stood at the foot of the bed, occasionally helping Muh with whatever it was she was doing between Michonne's legs to help her with the baby and giving her a pep talk that consisted mostly of telling her how good she was doing, how soon the baby would be there, and things like that. Daryl wasn't sure that it helped or not, but he figured it couldn't hurt.

Daryl ignored the fact that Michonne dug her fingers into his thighs once she started pushing. He picked up Carol's mantra and they both repeated it. He figured if one person saying it was good, two people saying it was better.

"You doin' good, 'Chonne," he repeated. "Baby's gonna be here soon, 'Chonne, you doin' good, real good. Keep goin'."

Daryl kept glancing at Muh who was concentrating on whatever it was she was doing and he glanced around from time to time taking in the room. Michonne was completely naked, but Daryl was positive that was absolutely her last concern at the moment. Michonne was also oily, though Daryl wasn't really sure why. The oil had a good smell to it, though, so at least there was that to be thankful for. He imagined it may have been some of Muh's doing, since she was famous for all kinds of poultices and the like. Mark and Rachel stood to the side with their arms crossed as though they were waiting for something, and Daryl assumed that they had roles or were there just in case they were needed.

Daryl guessed that it had been about a half an hour since he'd arrived before Carol's chants to Michonne changed. One of his legs was beginning to go very numb from being trapped in an odd position, and the other he was sure was going to show quite a few war wounds from Michonne's fingers.

Leaned against him, Michonne was obviously suffering, and she bucked back against him from time to time. He did his best, though, to support her and hoped he was offering her everything he could. Carol assured Michonne, and him at the same time, that the baby was almost there. Michonne was on her second of the "one more pushes" when she finally sunk against Daryl, immediately less tense than she had been and Carol cheered.

Daryl looked toward the foot of the bed in time to seen Muh smiling up at him, her toothless gums completely visible for a second before she dipped her head again and a moment later Carol lifted the baby up and carried it over to a table that they'd brought in for just the occasion of the birth.

"You have a son," Muh said.

Daryl realized he was holding his breath as soon as the baby started wailing. Carol was mopping at the baby or something, and he couldn't see it well from where he was. Michonne leaned back against him and he leaned around her, kissing the side of her face.

"I told ya it was a boy," he said.

Michonne smiled slightly at him, and moved her hand to wrap his in it.

"You were right," she said.

Daryl nuzzled the side of her face, kissing her again.

"Ya done good," he said. "I love ya."

"I love you too," she said.

Daryl watched as Carol came around, the baby in her arms wrapped in a blanket. She leaned slightly over the bed, stretching her hands out and gently put the baby in Michonne's arms. Daryl leaned over Michonne and tried to see his son who had already quieted down.

"He's perfect," Carol said. "Ten fingers, ten toes, and we can already tell he's got a set of lungs."

"He is perfect," Michonne said, opening the blanket a little and examining the baby. "And I know his daddy is dying to hold him." She said, looking at Carol.

Carol reached and took the baby back.

"Come on, daddy," she said to Daryl. "Why don't you take him downstairs where it's warmer for just a bit? We'll finish up in here and Mark and Rachel can go and get everyone to come around and admire him."

Daryl slipped from around Michonne, supporting her with one arm while he quickly arranged the pillows behind her. He eased her back on the pillows and kissed her.

"No more," she said, narrowing her eyes at him when he pulled away. Daryl smiled.

"No more, 'Chonne," Daryl said. "We all done."

Michonne smiled at him and made a kissing face so he brought his lips back to hers for a moment. Finally, he stood up and accepted the baby from Carol.

"He seems too little," Daryl said.

Carol smiled at him.

"That's just because you've forgotten how little they are when they're brand new. He's just fine. Now take him downstairs and keep him warm. We'll let you know when everything here is done and Michonne's resting and ready to give the little guy is first meal," Carol said, tucking the blanket around the baby that was snuggled into Daryl's arms. "Does he have a name?"

"Zeb," Daryl said, grinning. "Right, 'Chonne?"

"Right," Michonne said.

"It's a nice name," Muh said. "It is suiting for such a strong young man."

Mark and Rachel slipped out of the room and down the stairs. Daryl carefully carried the baby that seemed to be sleeping now and eased down the stairs one at a time in an effort not to jostle his brand new son. He heard them disappear out the door long before he finally made it to bottom and carefully crossed the living room, sitting carefully on the side of the couch closest to the fireplace so that the baby wouldn't get cold.

Daryl didn't dare to completely uncover the baby for fear that the chill in the house would be too much for him, but he did carefully root around inside the blanket until he found one of his tiny hands. Daryl spread his son's little fingers over his fingertip and marveled at him. He was so little, yet everything on him looked so perfect.

Daryl felt, for just a moment, that his life was more perfect than he'd imagined it could ever be. Upstairs they were taking care of Michonne and she was fine. The birth had held no traumatic events for her and it hadn't ended in any of the nightmarish ways that Daryl had feared from time to time. She was just fine. His daughter would be there soon, excited to see the "bebe" as she would call him. And now his son was sleeping, nestled in the crook of his arm.

For a world that had gone to hell, Daryl wasn't sure that he could possibly feel like things were any more wonderful.


	114. Chapter 114

The traffic in the house was almost mindboggling at one point. Daryl sat back on the couch, the baby wrapped in his arms. He wanted everyone to see his son, he really did, but he didn't care for the bunching about they did, and if one more person made a move to reach out like they were going to try to take the baby, he thought he might go insane.

Upstairs things seemed to be calming down. The traffic from up there passed back and forth a couple of times carrying sheets and buckets of water and moving things. Daryl left them to what they were doing since it seemed to be organized and understood by everyone involved, and he focused on trying to keep grabby hands away from his son.

Rachel had come down and wanted to hold the baby. Stella wanted to hold the baby even though Maggie had given her the one that she'd acquired to hold for the moment. Even Libby was a little grabbish and Daryl just didn't care for it. Sadie was the only saving grace of the women, apparently seeing that he didn't really _want_ to let them hold him, because she sat beside him on the couch, sort of pushing them away for him.

Hope and Judith climbed on the couch next to him, using Sadie as a jungle gym, and he tried to be patient with their jostling of the cushions. He realized they were small and the "bebe" as they both called him was a new phenomenon to them, especially given their recent fascination with Michonne's stomach, but he'd seen what the two of them were capable with when it came to toys and Zeb was far more breakable than a toy.

Sadie held them back, though, letting them peek over Daryl and squeal at the baby. He thought they could have been quieter, too, but Sadie wasn't very good at policing the noise.

Finally, his saving grace appeared in the form of Carol who came down behind Muh. Muh didn't say anything to anyone, she merely passed through the house and disappeared out the door. Carol, however stood at the bottom of the stairs and cleared her throat so that everyone somewhat glanced in her direction.

"I know there's a lot of excitement, right now, but I'm going to have to disturb you all," she said. "Rachel, do you think you could see about getting everyone fed?"

Rachel nodded.

"Libby, Stella, could you give me a hand?" Rachel asked, getting up from where she was sitting on the arm of the chair.

Both of the young women stood up and went with her out the door and Daryl was already grateful that the crowd was lessening a little.

"Daryl, Sadie's going to watch the girls for a little longer for us, why don't you come upstairs now? Michonne's resting and I think that she'd like to have a little look at that baby and see if he's maybe ready to have his first meal," Carol said.

Daryl didn't need more than one invitation to get up from the couch and leave everyone that was still in his living room to figuring out that visitation was over. He eased through the room and past Carol to start up the stairs. When he got to the top, the room was cleared out except for Michonne who was lying in bed, her eyes closed. In the time that he'd been gone, they'd cleaned the room up and changed the blankets and sheets. Also, from somewhere, Michonne had earned an IV and the sight of it worried Daryl a little.

"She OK?" He asked, trying to keep his voice down.

Carol raised an eyebrow at him and then nodded, smiling.

"Just fine" she said. "Resting is all. It's been a long day," Carol said.

Daryl was still leery as he looked into the room, almost hesitant to go in. Carol pushed at him.

"Go on, Daryl, she's fine," Carol urged. "Is it the IV that's freaking you out? Mark just did that to hydrate her quickly, that's all. It's nothing serious."

Daryl felt a little relieved, but he was still worried. It seemed like these days you could get your hopes up too quickly very often and he didn't want to find out that something was wrong that he hadn't anticipated.

"I'm fine, Daryl," Michonne said. "Just fine."

He noticed that at first she didn't open her eyes, but finally she did.

"Mark asked me if I wanted it since it's quicker and being dehydrated isn't much fun when you're trying to make milk," Michonne said. "Come on, I want to see the baby."

Daryl smiled then and went to the bed. Michonne eased herself up a little on the pillows. Daryl rested his son in her arms and the baby stirred. Michonne unbuttoned the shirt that she was wearing, one of the long sleeved shirts that Daryl kept around for the cold weather, and worked a moment to convince the baby to latch onto the nipple that she offered him. Daryl watched, worried at first because the baby didn't seem to be catching onto what he was supposed to be doing, but finally he got it.

"Are you sure ya OK?" Daryl asked. He rubbed Michonne's cheek and brought his lips to hers, kissing her again. She leaned into the kiss a little, tangling her tongue with his for a second before pulling back.

"I'm fine, Daryl," she said. "Mark's gone to get me something and apparently I'm going to feel even better when he gets back."

Daryl watched her as she rubbed her finger across the baby's cheek.

"Did Hope see him?" She asked.

"Kinda," Daryl said. "They was too many people down there, 'Chonne. Everybody's all crazy actin' and grabbin' at the baby and it's got Hope and Judith all stirred up."

"We might let her sleep on it," Michonne said. "In the morning she'll be calmer and we can bring her in here and let her sit with us a little. She's got to be able to inspect him and realize she's got to be gentle. It won't be that bad as long as we're calm too."

"He's perfect, 'Chonne," Daryl said, looking at his son who was very lazily sucking, appearing to alternate between wanting to suck and deciding that sleeping was a much better idea.

"He is perfect, Daryl," Michonne said. "Do you still like the name?"

Daryl smiled.

"I do like it," Daryl said. "I already been tryin' it on him."

Michonne smiled.

"You remember this means it's going to be a while before we sleep well, don't you?" Michonne asked.

Daryl nodded. He remembered well how often Hope woke up when she was very little. They napped more than they slept and he was always grateful if they had any time and energy to spend together while she slept.

"We need to haul the crib in here," Daryl said. "So he don't wake up Jude an' Hope."

"That's true," Michonne said. "Maybe Tyreese can help you do that?"

"I ain't seen him since I was outside, but I'm sure he ain't gonna mind. He and Beau had to go and find a crib across the community for Maggie and wash it up. Movin' one across the hall ain't no big deal," Daryl said.

Michonne finally pulled the baby away from her breast, seeing that he had lost interest in it. He whined a little and she burped him.

"Daryl, do you think you could go in the nursery and get one of the pacifiers that we put in the basket on the corner of the changing table in there? Any one of them will do. They're all clean." Michonne said.

Daryl got up and quickly slipped into the room. The house was quiet and he was thankful for that. He didn't know where everyone had gone, but at least they weren't crowding into his home anymore. He found the pacifiers and picked through them, finding the one he liked best for Zeb. He knew the baby wouldn't care, but he still wanted to pick out the best one.

Daryl brought the pacifier back. Michonne took it and offered it to the baby who took it almost immediately and stopped making the whining noise that he kept producing from time to time. Daryl leaned back in the bed beside Michonne, ignoring the fact that he was somewhat hanging off the edge, and wrapped his arm around her shoulder. She rested her head against him, and both of them were content, for a while, to simply watch Zeb sleeping.

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Tyreese had helped Daryl move the crib so that the baby could sleep in the room with them. He'd also carried the dishes from their dinner back to headquarters so that Carol wouldn't feel the need to make the trip in the cold. He knew that Muh wanted to limit, at least for a bit, how much cold air she breathed in, requesting that she wrap a scarf around her face when she insisted on being outside, and he was inclined to agree with anything that Muh said regarding people's health…especially Carol's.

When Tyreese got back to the house, Daryl and Michonne had the door to their room closed. He could hear the howling and new that their brand new baby boy was breaking his silence to show them how well he could keep them awake. He chuckled a little as he slipped into the nursery.

"The bebe crying," Judith said to Carol who was trying to wrestle her into her pajamas.

"Yes, the baby is crying. He's OK, though, he's just crying because he's a baby," she said.

Tyreese checked on Hope. She was already in her crib, apparently having received earlier attention from either Carol or Sadie who had brought the girls. Now she was lying on her back, snuggling whatever kind of animal it was that she had…he'd never been sure what it was supposed to be, and staring up at the ceiling. He could tell that she was well on her way to going to sleep, but she grinned at him when he looked over the side of the crib.

"Why are you smiling at me?" Tyreese growled. The voice made Hope giggle and Tyreese chuckled. When he was genuinely angry about something, the girls would almost cry at the same voice and facial expression, but somehow they seemed to know when he was doing it just to play with them and they both thought it was the funniest thing in the world. He reached in the crib, tucking the baby blanket around Hope's middle and leaning in to kiss the hand she offered up to him to kiss.

"Scare me, Dada!" Judith commanded. Tyreese turned around to find Carol still sitting on the floor and Judith now in her bed with her duck.

Tyreese worked for a second to wipe the smile off his face, trying to narrow his eyebrows and look as angry as he possibly could, despite the fact that Judith was already wearing a broad grin in anticipation of the act.

"You better be asleep right now, Judith!" He growled. Judith cackled and plopped back on her pillow, hugging her duck up to her face and peeking around it.

"Again!" She squealed.

"There is no again at bedtime!" Tyreese growled. The girl squealed again and he stooped down, kissing her forehead. He smiled at her this time. "Alright, goodnight, Jude. It's really bedtime."

Tyreese reached around and pulled Carol up off the floor by the arm that she kept flapping against the back of his leg as though he was going to forget that she was there and waiting on him. They bid goodnight to the girls, both of whom were more than seasoned by this routine, and left the nursery, blowing out the lamp in there and closing the door.

"Hope wasn't too upset tonight?" Tyreese asked, guiding Carol toward the bedroom.

"No," she said, shaking her head. She crossed the room and quickly starting undressing to get her pajamas on before she froze to death. "We've been going through what was going to happen so much that neither of the girl's seemed to notice. She did make Sadie put her to bed, though. She tried to go home with her."

Tyreese chuckled, shucking his clothes and crawling into bed as quickly as possible.

"Come on, woman, it's cold in here," he said, holding up the cover for Carol to slip under it. She slipped under and slid up against him. He gently wrapped his arm around her waist and waited for her to blow out the lamp and settle down. Across the hall it sounded like Zeb started up again for whatever reason. "The girls like Sadie a lot," Tyreese said, once they'd settled in.

Carol yawned.

"Sadie's patient with them. She knows how to handle kids…I guess she had a lot of practice once upon a time," Carol said.

"Little Zeb is giving his parents a rough first night," Tyreese said.

Carol snickered.

"Do you remember Hope? She was the same way," Carol said. "I don't remember Jude being so bad, but I didn't have her full time when she was really small."

Tyreese grunted his understanding, moving his hand a little to run his palm over Carol's hip and down her thigh.

"When Julie was born," Tyreese said, "I feel like we didn't sleep for six months. I know it was less than that, but at the time it just seemed like she never wanted to sleep. What's worse was I working the whole time, so I had to be up early and at work. I tried to get up at night with her some, but after the first week of not sleeping, I thought I'd die. My wife finally told me to sleep in the other room so I wouldn't get fired."

Carol chuckled a little.

"I bet you were a good daddy," she said. She yawned. "I could see you all sleep deprived. Poor Daryl. He's done this once already, but he still doesn't know how to process everything with Zeb. You can see that he thinks he's going to break him, and he's worried about Michonne."

"I think that's normal," Tyreese said. "When they're that little they seem terribly easy to break, and Lori just freaked everyone out about babies being born."

"True," Carol said, "but Michonne didn't have any trouble. To be honest, she makes it look easy." Carol was quiet for a second. "But then again, Michonne has a tendency to make a lot of things look easy."

"What about Sophia?" Tyreese asked. "What was it like when she was born?"

"Which part?" Carol asked. He felt her put her hand over his, threading her fingers between his.

"Whichever part," he said. It wasn't always easy to get Carol talking about her past. A lot of it she seemed to just not want to talk about. She got into definite stages of wanting to leave the past there, behind her.

"Let's see," she said. "Ed left me at the hospital…he picked me up three hours after they released me. So I got to spend that time bonding with her in the lobby of the hotel…"

Her voice trailed off and Tyreese felt an obvious shiver run through her body. He freed his hand from hers and brought it around, rubbing her back a little.

"Hey, don't tell me about Ed, OK? You don't have to think about him," he said. He didn't want her to talk about Ed, but now that she had he knew how this would go down. She'd talk with him a little while longer, and they'd go to sleep, and the nightmares would return. There were always nightmares, some worse than others, on any night she happened to talk about Ed before she tried to sleep. "Just tell me about Sophia, the good parts…"

After a moment, Tyreese could feel some of the tension being released from her back muscles and Carol sighed.

"Sophia was a good baby," she said. "She cried, sure, but she was just a baby. She didn't have any other way to communicate. I didn't think she was bad, but Ed…" she stopped. "She was a good baby," Carol continued after a second.

Tyreese reached around her, turning her face toward him. She slid enough in the bed so that he could reach her. He felt like a blind man feeling in the dark for her lips, but when he found them, he kissed her, trying to avoid her cheeks because he didn't want to feel any of the tears he was certain were there.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I shouldn't have brought it up."

"No," she said, "it's not your fault. I mean, it's only natural to talk about it, right? That was life," she said.

"I know," Tyreese said, "but some aspects of that life, like Ed, are better left right where they are. You shouldn't have to think about them anymore."

"But not Sophia," Carol said.

"No, not Sophia," Tyreese said. "Though I do wish that somehow she wasn't so tangled up in Ed's memory."

Carol mumbled something and Tyreese wrapped his arm around her again.

"I wouldn't have changed anything about her," Carol said, "not even that she was Ed's child, but I do wish that I'd have left him. She would have had a better life if I'd have been brave enough to leave him."

Tyreese rubbed her arm.

"Don't start that either," Tyreese said. "You did what you thought was best and you did what you thought you could do. I'm not blaming you for it, Sophia never blamed you for it, and so you might as well not keep yourself up blaming yourself for it."

"I guess you're right," Carol said. She sighed.

"When it comes to you," Tyreese said, "I'm always right. Now get some sleep."

"You too," Carol said.

"I will," Tyreese responded. He knew that he'd get more sleep than she did, even though he was more than certain now that he'd be awake within a matter of hours talking her out of every bad thought that had decided to invade her sleeping mind. "I love you, Carol."

"Love you too, Tyreese," Carol said.

Tyreese tightened his grip on her just a little and shifted as she shifted, attempting to get them both settled and the cover over both of them. For the moment, everything in the house was quiet and he knew that they'd better try to get to sleep before the littlest Dixon decided to wake the household again.


	115. Chapter 115

**AN: So I just thought that I would let everyone still reading know that I'm diving into a complicated work schedule which means updates will be only as frequent as I can make them (and that's not that often, I'm sure) and they will likely be a little shorter than they are sometimes. This is especially true as I'm learning what my new schedule is going to be like.**

**I just didn't want you to think I've run away. More notes at the end about the future of our story.**

**I hope you enjoy. This is somewhat of a Rick-centric chapter.**

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Rick had convinced Judith that she wanted to spend the morning with him after she'd finished breakfast. It really hadn't been all that difficult to convince her since he was using the animals as bait, but she'd agreed and he'd swung her up on his shoulders and carried her down to the barns.

Rick stood to the side and leaned against the door frame of the barn while Judith went around, talking to all the animals that allowed her to pet them. Rick watched her, amazed at how big she was getting, how well she was speaking. She was growing up and she was looking more and more like Lori every day, especially now that she was beginning, although slightly, to lose her baby appearance and take on more the look of a young girl.

Rick realized that when he looked at Judith, he thought of Lori, just like when he looked at Carl, but that was really the only time these days that he let his mind drift to Lori. It wasn't that he'd forgotten her, or that he'd made any effort to forget her…it was more that he'd finally moved on. She had been an important part of his life. The first woman that he'd ever loved, and the only woman that he'd loved so far, but he was beginning to think that she may not be the last.

Rick knew that he was taken with Sadie. He didn't want to venture to say that it was anything more. Physically they'd had nothing more than a few chaste kisses and one make out session that probably only romantically ranked them as clumsy teenagers. But there was a lot more to her than that and there was a lot more to what he was beginning to feel about her than that.

Sadie was, as surprising as he found it, someone he enjoyed having conversations with. There wasn't any judgment with Sadie, no matter what he wanted to say to her. She simply accepted it, tried to help him if he presented a problem, and then moved on.

Rick wondered, too, if one thing he liked about Sadie was that she challenged him. He felt like at every turn she always had some question for him to answer about himself, some challenge as to what he wanted out of the life that they might find out there, and she never seemed to let him get away with any halfhearted answers.

She helped him with Carl and Judith too, and his feelings on both of them. Carl was growing up, and that was the simple truth of the matter. The boy was beginning to look at Rick less and less for the same kind of guidance that he once had and Rick was starting to feel more like an onlooker in his son's life. Carl was becoming a man. He wanted to be Rick's friend more than he wanted to receive fatherly lectures, and Sadie was urging Rick to let Carl spread his wings. She told him that one day, if he was lucky, he'd be navigating this world on his own, and it was better to let him start practicing flying solo when Rick was still around to catch him, than to try to shelter him until he simply couldn't any longer.

With Judith there was more for him to deal with. He'd accepted that he would never be for Judith more than a dear uncle at best, but that didn't mean that guilt didn't gnaw at him from time to time for not having been what he meant to be. Sadie was good at helping him through the guilt, at least until it reared its head again, and pushing him not to give into it. Instead, she pushed him toward trying to find what he could _have_ with Judith instead of regretting what he had _lost_.

Rick snickered at Judith now who was on her hands and knees crawling around in one of the fenced off areas that they had fixed for the pigs. She was going to be filthy, but that wasn't nothing unusual, and he knew that Carol wouldn't mind him bringing her back like this.

"It's big piggy!" Judith squealed, wrapping her arms around one of the pigs that was complacent enough to lie there while she crawled around it, hugging it.

"That is a big piggy, Judith," Rick said. "Did you make sure your chickens were happy today?"

Judith loved all the animals. Most of the kids seemed to love them all. And as a result, they'd quickly domesticated a good number of them, even it was against their will. The two boys that Libby and Beau seemed to be trying to bring up together were rough and tumble. The oldest being a good bit older than Judith, and the youngest being around her age. Jacob was the oldest and was quite good at catching the animals, even when they didn't want to be caught. He'd take the scratches and the bites that came with the job, as long as it resulted in having a chicken or a pig to pet.

Judith and the others reaped the rewards of Jacob's sacrifices because once he domesticated the creatures, they were free to be mauled by the likes of the other children. Judith's favorites were the chickens, so when Rick mentioned them, she immediately lost interest in her pig.

"We get eggs!" She called at him, standing up and wiping her knees off with her hands in a manner that was almost too ladylike for a little girl who had been crawling around in dirty hay after a pig.

"Come on out," Rick said, holding his hand down toward her. "We'll go see if there are eggs."

Judith crawled back between the wooden slats that served to fence off the area and accepted Rick's hand. He didn't even look to see whatever it was that squished between their two hands because he wasn't certain that he wanted to know. He walked her over to the still unfinished hanging coops that they were building and lifted her up so that she could look in, bending back the wire door. The chickens in the coops were far more interested, almost any time the door was opened, to run the through the available wire network and escape capture than they were to protect any of the nests and they scattered in a flurry of feathers and squawks. The rooster was leashed outside for the moment, so Judith was able to carefully examine the nests without bother.

"Any eggs?" Rick asked her, already spying two. He doubted there were more than that anywhere in there given the fact that the women would have cleaned out the nests earlier.

"Oh yes," Judith said, somewhat dramatically. Rick offered her one of the baskets hanging nearby and she carefully put the two eggs in there, having some kind of little conversation with each of them as she transferred them from one location to the other. Rick supposed he could take them to headquarters and the women could use them when they wanted them.

"That all the eggs?" He asked.

Judith searched around but finally nodded, wrapping her arms around him and letting him take her out the coop. She yawned a little and scrubbed her face against his. He smiled at the act. He gathered up her basket with the two eggs and twisted the wire door shut again so that the captive birds could feel they were secure from the prying eyes and hands of anyone that would bother their wire sanctuary.

"Come on," he said, kissing her forehead. "Let's go down and see if anyone needs us."

He put her down and she ran ahead of him. He closed the barn door and walked a few feet behind her, carrying the basket with the two eggs. Judith seemed pleased, and the morning might have gone off without a hitch at all, except that as they got close to headquarters Judith stumbled over her feet and spilled to the ground.

Even from a distance Rick knew the fall had been no major incident. He approached her, helped her up, and saw that she had no other markings besides a very, very tiny scrape on her palm. Unfortunately, Judith had decided in this instant that the scrape was nearly life threatening and her howling probably indicated to the community that something akin to a Walker attack was taking place.

Rick scooped her up, balancing her against his hip, but the magic was broken. He was not soothing at all. Through her howling all she wanted was Mama, and he knew he wasn't going to be able to fix this. As he got to headquarters, the howling had intensified to an almost gagging cry and Rick was trying not to smile at the dramatics taking place. Carol came out of the house they'd established as headquarters and Rick lowered Judith to the ground so that she could run to her, holding out her palm, and receive the correct form of comfort for the injuries she'd sustained.

Carol kneeled down and Judith wrapped her arms around her, still crying.

"What happened?" Carol asked, looking confused. Rick finally smiled then.

"Judith stumbled," he said. "Scraped her hand."

Carol pushed the little girl off of her enough to wipe at her face and Judith stuck her hand right in her face.

"Is it really bad?" Carol asked Judith, who was beginning to calm down a little.

Judith nodded, moaning pathetically and confirming that the fall had indeed been tragic.

"Well we're going to have to clean that up," Carol said. She looked at Rick and winked.

"I hold you!" Judith declared, wrapping her arms around Carol again. Carol chuckled.

"I think it might be nap time, too," Carol said. Judith pulled away then, shaking her head, the cry now more one that she was maintaining out of her own interest more than really one dedicated to the real pain and suffering she'd already endured.

"No! It's not naptime!" Judith cried out.

Carol nodded her head.

"I wasn't talking about you," she said. "It's my nap time. Can you hold me and put me down for a nap after we clean your hand up? Please?"

Judith looked like she was considering and then nodded. Carol got up and Rick realized where Judith had come across the habit of dusting her knees off like she did, though Judith didn't seem to really understand why she was doing it since she'd immediately crawl back on the ground again. Judith took Carol's hand and Carol walked toward Rick before heading off in the direction of their house.

"She's fine," Carol said. "She just gets touchy when it's nap time and Hope went down at least forty minutes ago, so I'm sure Jude's feeling it."

"I understand," he said. "She did find two eggs." He held up the basket. "I'll put them inside."

Carol nodded at him.

"Can you say bye bye to Rick?" Carol asked Judith. "Thank him for taking you to get eggs?"

Judith waved at him, but he could tell he wasn't getting much more than that at the moment. He reached over and patted her head before walking toward headquarters, leaving Carol to take Judith and be put down for a nap.

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Rick found Daryl and Tyreese holding down one of the porches on a house they didn't use and watching some sort of spectacle, though he wasn't entirely sure what was going on. He mounted the porch steps and sat down on the floor of the porch next to Daryl.

"Have you got any idea where Carl is?" Rick asked.

Daryl looked at him, chewing something that he and Tyreese were eating out of a metal bowl.

"Figured ya knew," Daryl said. "Beau took him out doin' some kinda target practice or huntin' or somethin'. Took him an' that kid Jacob."

"Beau took Carl and a five year old outside the community?" Rick asked.

Daryl shrugged.

"He was takin' the kid and since he and Libby is as just as good as raisin' them young'uns I couldn't exactly say nothin' to him. Carl just went with 'em," Daryl said.

Rick sighed.

"Don't worry about it too much," Tyreese said, sucking his fingers. "There are hardly any Walkers out there and Sadie had Stella kill off what was around the fence line this morning during their practice or whatever you want to call it."

Rick turned his attention briefly to the spectacle the two men were watching. He didn't know what was going on, but Sadie and Rachel looked like they were fighting. Michonne was standing nearby and every now and again she paced a few steps.

"What's going on here?" Rick asked, realizing that even if it annoyed him that Carl had left without telling him, he couldn't exactly go running after Beau. He wasn't likely to find the boy if Beau didn't want to be found, and Carl was picking up, more and more, Beau's ability to slip around unseen.

"Your new girlfriend is whippin' your old girlfriend's ass, that's what's happenin'," Daryl said with a chuckle.

Rick had no idea what Daryl was talking about.

"Are they really fighting?" Rick asked, looking back at the women.

"No," Tyreese said. "Well…yes and no. They're really making contact with one another, but it's part of Sadie's hand to hand combat training. She whipped up on Stella for a while earlier and now she's rolling Rachel around. Probably isn't going to last too much longer though, you can tell she's getting tired and Rachel will roll her soon."

Tyreese leaned over, offering Rick the bowl. Rick looked at it and wrinkled his nose.

"What is that?" He asked.

"Don't know," Tyreese said. "Muh gave it to us. Tastes a little like sauerkraut. Not too bad. It's supposed to cleanse something or align something or whatever. We figured it wasn't half bad and we don't have popcorn."

Rick chuckled but refused any of whatever the two men were eating. He didn't think the little old woman was likely to poison anyone, but that didn't mean that he wanted to eat things that were unidentified. He wasn't sure that she would be above feeding them things that he had no interest in ever saying he'd tried.

"What's Michonne doing?" Rick asked.

"Mostly tryin' ta test my patience," Daryl said. "Zeb ain't been here a week an' she's been circling 'round the two of them like she's wantin' to get in on it. I ain't lettin' her tangle up with nobody, not yet."

Rick chuckled.

"So that's what you're doing here? Making sure Michonne doesn't try to fight with Sadie?" Rick asked.

"Not really," Tyreese answered. "Daryl's on Zeb duty and I suggested we watch this instead of sit around in the house.

"Where's the baby?" Rick asked, looking around.

"Down in my shirt," Daryl responded.

Rick looked at him and realized the jacket he was wearing did look a little lumpy.

"Muh packed him in there," Daryl said. "He's sleepin' and it's warm in there. She said he liked hearin' my heartbeat."

"So you let the old woman burrow around in your clothes and then you ate her mystery food?" Rick asked.

Daryl shrugged and took more of the mystery dish.

"Food ain't half bad and I reckon if 'Chonne let her pull the baby outta her, I can at least let her dig around in my shirt for a bit," Daryl said. He sucked his fingers clean and looked down into the cavern of his own clothes. "He looks happy in there so I ain't complainin'."

"That kid lets you know real quick when he isn't happy," Tyreese said.

They sat there for a bit. Sadie and Rachel had finished whatever fight it was they were having, and now both of them were standing and talking to Michonne a few feet away from the men.

"So Sadie's workin' on trainin' us for attacks, how likely do ya think some attacks are?" Daryl asked Rick after a bit.

Rick shrugged.

"Between all three groups we've made contact with about eight other groups in the area, all relatively small. The others don't consider themselves stabilized groups. They claim to only be holding up for winter where they are," Rick said. "I've only met a few but I know Jeremiah's group is doing some trading with two of the groups that are headed for the coast. They came from farther west and basically want to swap out furs for food with him."

Daryl chuckled.

"We fur traders now?" Daryl asked.

Rick shrugged.

"I guess if you're going to eat it, you might as well wear it," Rick said. "We've got those deer hides and rabbit hides stored up in one of the smokehouses."

"True," Daryl said. "But we ain't done nothin' with 'em yet."

"Yet is probably the key word," Tyreese said. "We're already doing things we never thought we'd be doing when this whole things started. Wearing hide and fur is probably somewhere down the line."

"I'd rather have it than not have it, honestly," Rick said. "We still haven't decided for sure where we go from here. If we're going west like Jeremiah's group then winter is going to get harsher."

"If we go anywhere but south winter is going to get harsher," Daryl said. "I ain't opposed to wearin' fur and shit, don't get me wrong, I just think it's funny that we swappin' furs and all that."

"The times they are a' changing," Tyreese said with a chuckle.

The men were interrupted when Michonne and Sadie walked over a few minutes later.

"Ya oughtta sit down," Daryl said to Michonne.

"I'm fine," she said, easing down to sit on the step. "How's Zeb?"

"Sleepin' like he was earlier. He keeps wigglin' a little, but then he settles back down," Daryl said.

"You're a good kangaroo," Michonne said. Daryl chuckled at her.

"I just can't do nothin' when he starts fussin' for food," Daryl said. "How'd ya trainin' go?" Daryl asked, tapping Sadie who was swiping at her face with her shirt.

"Good," she said, panting.

"Ya ain't freezin'?" Daryl asked. She had slowly shucked off most of her layers while she'd been out there and it was cold enough that you couldn't afford to be too shy on clothes.

Sadie shook her head.

"Sweaty," she said. She turned to Rick. "I didn't think I'd say this, but there aren't enough Walkers." She laughed and shrugged. "I took Stella out to practice and we found maybe ten. We were hunting them."

She laughed again and Rick couldn't help but laugh at her.

"We never thought we'd be going hunting for Walkers, either," Rick said.

"It's the cold," Daryl offered. "Keeps 'em hunkered down somewhere."

"It's a good thing, too," Michonne said. "At least they're easier to keep thinned out when you can only find a dozen or so that you're looking for. I'm getting in on the training soon. Get back in shape." She nudged Sadie and Sadie smiled at her.

"I'm going," Sadie said. "I smell like a Walker."

She waved and then jogged off from them, gathering up her discarded clothes from the lawn and then starting in the direction of headquarters. Rick let his eyes trail after her. When he looked back at his comrades sitting around the porch, he realized they were all looking at him.

"What?" He asked, chuckling a little at the facial expressions of Daryl, Michonne, and Tyreese.

"Ya hit that yet?" Daryl asked.

Michonne playfully swatted his leg and he laughed.

Rick felt his face burn red now that the three of them were laughing.

"You don't have to answer that, Rick," Michonne said. Rick nodded a little.

"Yeah, not 'til she's gone ya don't," Daryl said. Michonne swatted him again.

"Is this the kind of stuff you want your son sitting around talking about?" Michonne teased.

"Sure is," Daryl said.

Michonne pulled herself up from the step.

"Give me my child. I'm leaving you men to do whatever it is that you do. I don't want to hear any more of it," Michonne said.

Daryl wrestled the baby free from his shirt and passed him to Michonne who quickly wrapped him up in her coat. She started to walk away.

"Go ahead," Tyreese called. "Get out of here. We know you ladies never talk about any of these things."

Michonne laughed as she walked off.

Rick stood up then.

"As much as I would love to entertain both of you, I'm not talking about Sadie that way," he said.

"That means ya ain't," Daryl said.

Rick shook his head and tried not to laugh at the two men.

"You know, I remember when neither of you were either," Rick said. He had intended to go, but now he was leaning against the railing. "We all have our dry spells."

"Winter's gon' be awful cold, Rick," Daryl teased.

"Worse than women," Rick said, turning and walking away. He ignored the cackling of the two men sitting on the porch behind him. He felt like his time with Sadie would eventually come, but the last thing he really wanted to do was rush it too much and risk having her give him the same kind of "let you down easy" speech she gave Beau. He didn't know what she'd really said, but the speech itself had almost become the stuff of legends in the community, and he wanted to avoid pushing her to that point. Even if it meant that Tyreese and Daryl…both of whom conveniently forgot their own relationship beginnings from time to time…saw fit to give him a hard time about it.

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**AN: OK, so if you're still with me, I'm glad and I hope you're enjoying the story. The exciting news is that I have actually seen all the way to the end of this fic and know when and where it's going to end. We've still got a little way to go, though, so it's not something that's immediate. At least that lets me know, though, what kind of development still needs to be done and what kind of wrap up we're headed for. **

**There are two sequels being planned. The first is already somewhat in the works. It will take place after a time jump and be a little different in formatting from this one, but it will contain some familiar faces and maybe even a few new ones. I'll tell you more about that, though, when we reach the end here. **

**I just thought I'd let you know that we've still got a way to go, but there is a definitive end in sight for this little leg of our journey! I hope you're still enjoying! **


	116. Chapter 116

**AN: As I said before, chapters are probably going to be shorter and more episodic than they have been from time to time. I'm just trying to keep things progressing, along with my other fics, so that we can make our way toward the close of this part of our journey together. So here's another little piece to our story.**

**I hope you enjoy.**

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"You know you should probably go and put her down before Zeb wakes her up," Michonne said. She was lying on her side on the bed with Zeb lying next to her. Daryl was leaning against the back of the bed on his side with Hope asleep in his arms.

Hope had insisted before bedtime on coming to see "Bebe"…still refusing to even try to call Zeb by his name, but she'd lost interest in the baby quickly and taken a much greater interest in having Daryl hold her. He hadn't really thought she was going to fall asleep, but there she was, limp in his arms, and breathing steadily, her little eyes twitching from time to time behind her eyelids.

"Can't she sleep in here with us, just for the night?" Daryl asked.

Michonne sighed.

"Daryl, if we let her sleep in here she's not going to sleep well. As soon as Zeb starts crying he's going to wake her up, and then she's up every two hours with him and we've got to get both of them back to sleep before he starts again. She'll rest better in her bed where it's quiet," Michonne said.

Daryl knew that Michonne was right. Zeb put his sister's memory to shame for being the most opinionated baby that Daryl had ever known. Zeb let you know the split second that something wasn't to his liking and he kept crying, normally, for at least three or four minutes after you fixed the issue as sort of a way to cement in your memory the grave injustice you'd done to him by letting him be hungry or letting his diaper be dirty. There was no way that Hope would sleep through any of Zeb's alarms for food if she was in the room.

He just didn't want to put her down, though. She was sleeping so peacefully curled against his chest, and Daryl, though he wouldn't want to admit it, was having a sort of sentimental moment. He didn't care, really, that his brother would have given him hell for it either. He couldn't help but notice how big Hope was, and the fact was really driven home because of how tiny her little brother was.

Daryl had never really believed that he'd have the children in his imagination. They'd been fun to think about, but he hadn't actually indulged himself enough to really thing that one day they'd be made of flesh and blood. Then, when Hope had been born, everything had been in turmoil. Everything seemed so dire, so hard to navigate. Daryl had been terrified every single step of the way that his little girl, who was actually real, was going to be ripped away from him before he even got to know her well.

Now, though, things seemed different. The Walkers were out there, the threats were still out there, and people like the Governor, or maybe even worse, existed. Still, no matter how dangerous it might still be, it was easy to forget that sometimes.

Maybe he was just lulled into a false comfort, but for now Daryl could see that his daughter _was_ growing, right before his eyes, and she was, in his opinion, very far removed from what she had been when she was Zeb's age.

And just for tonight, bathed in the light from the lamp that burned on the bedside table, Daryl didn't fear that his daughter wouldn't grow up, he feared that she would grow up too quickly. He could almost say that he missed, in anticipation, the moments just like this one where she let herself fall completely into abandon, curled in his arms. He knew, too, that one day the same days would come for his son.

He'd be happy to see them grow, and be thrilled to know that they were becoming everything that they could be and that they were surviving this world, whatever it may be like in five years or ten years or however long the world even continued, but he felt like part of him would be sad to know that they were no longer the tiny little beings that he could wrap in his arms and protect from anything that tried to threaten them.

"Is something wrong, Daryl?" Michonne asked. Her voice was a little groggy and he glanced over at her. She was apparently dozing in and out of sleep, waiting for when Zeb would next inform her that he'd like to eat.

"Huh?" Daryl asked.

"Are you alright? You look like something's wrong," Michonne said.

Daryl shook his head. He was sure that Michonne would probably understand the feelings that he was having, but he didn't feel like sharing them at the moment.

"I'm fine," Daryl said. "Just thinkin' how pretty Hope is right now."

Michonne smiled at him.

"She is pretty," Michonne said. "You really should put her down before long, though. I don't know how much longer your son is going to let her sleep in here."

Daryl watched as Michonne leaned up a little, pressing at her breasts with her finger tips.

"It's not going to be too long," she said.

Daryl nodded his understanding. He wasn't sure how she did it exactly, but Michonne was pretty fair at guessing when Zeb was going to wake up during the night. She almost always called it.

Daryl slid off the bed gently, careful not to wake Hope, and crossed around to Michonne's side of the bed. So as to not wake her, Michonne kissed her fingertips and pressed the kiss to the sleeping girl as Daryl dipped down a little to let her see her. He eased out of the room after that and slipped into the nursery where he could hear Judith sleeping. Her breathing was raspy and Carol had already commented earlier that evening that she was going to get Muh to look at the girl because she was afraid she was starting to get sick.

Daryl eased Hope into her crib and she stirred a little before settling. He wrapped her blanket around her and brushed her curls back from her forehead a little.

Just as he was leaving the nursery and closing the door behind him as quietly as possible, he heard his son howling. He'd made the move just in time or he'd be trying to quiet Hope down right now, and she wasn't an easy one to deal with when her sleep was interrupted.

Daryl came back into the bedroom to find Michonne already rolling their son into position and trying to convince him to stop crying long enough to take what he wanted.

Daryl smiled to himself.

He'd miss these moments with his children, he was sure of that, but he also realized he'd miss them a lot more when his children were sleeping peacefully than when they were screaming about something to beat the band.

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Beau had only been working the nails lose for about four minutes when he heard Libby's footsteps bounding down the staircase behind him. He hear the _thunk_ of the wood as she tossed another piece into the fireplace.

"What the hell ya think ya doin'?" Libby asked from behind him.

Beau didn't look up from what he was doing. He didn't think he was doing anything. He knew exactly what was happening and if she paid attention to it for about two more minutes she'd know exactly what he was doing too. He continued working until he'd wrenched the nail out of the board, silently giving Libby credit for her hammering abilities. If anything else needed building he was going to suggest that to Tyreese that they put Libby on hammering duty.

"Beau!" Libby called.

"What?" Beau asked, not taking his attention from the next nail that he'd moved to.

"I asked ya a question," Libby said. "Now what the hell ya think ya doin'?"

"I'm takin' this stuff down," Beau said. "We don't need it an' it's gettin' ta be a right big pain in the ass, Libby. Takes forever ta get stuff in an' out that window an' Carol won't even come in here so I gotta pass her the dirty clothes out the window every time they've got a mind ta do the washin'. Ain't no need in havin' it 'cause it ain't doin' nothin'."

"What if some a' them things come through?" Libby asked. Beau didn't turn around because he didn't need to. He knew by now exactly how he would find her. She'd be standing there, at least if not one of her hands cocked up on her hips.

"Then they come through, Libby," Beau said. "Don't reckon these boards gon' do nothin' ta slow 'em down. Not if'n they got the mind ta open the door. They can figure that out they just as soon climb through the window. 'Sides, ya know good as me that if they come through we gon' be out there like we was last time, fightin' for what we're worth an' not back here cowerin' behind some half rotted boards. Throw that one in the fire," Beau said, tossing the now free board in the direction of the fireplace.

"What about Emma? Jacob? Sam? What the gon' do if we leave 'em in here ta fight them things an' then they get in here with 'em?" Libby asked.

Beau moved to the next nail down and started trying to work it out of the board. He'd have to remember to get all the nails up off the floor before someone stepped on one and it went through their shoe. It wasn't an injury that was lethal by any means, but it didn't mean it wouldn't hurt for a spell.

"Emma's big enough she ought ta be out there trainin' with Sadie," Beau responded. "Can't keep 'em all shut up forever an' Emma ain't no tiny thing. I swear Carol'll have Jude out there fightin' Walkers 'fore you ever even let Emma near one."

"I ain't lettin' my sister get chewed up by one a' those things for no damn reason, Beau!" Libby responded.

Beau chuckled. The girl could get fired up quicker than anyone he'd ever met before.

"Then let her start trainin' with Sadie," Beau said. "She oughta learn an' Sadie's a good one ta teach her how ta hold her own. Ya don't get on with it soon an' we gon' move on an' then she's gonna get chewed up 'cause she ain't knowed how ta take care a' herself."

Beau freed the board and tossed it in the general direction that he'd thrown the first. He continued downward, working his way toward the floor while Libby stood somewhere behind him and continued the argument.

"I reckon ya gonna say Sam an' Jacob need ta be runnin' 'round with knives then, fightin' off the damn things too?" Libby asked.

Beau chuckled.

"I don't reckon Sam's ready for it just now. Only 'cause he ain't stable enough on his feet the whole time an' he'd be fell down an' stabbed himself without meanin' to, but Jacob's already learnin' with me how ta use weapons an' it ain't a day too early," Beau said.

"He's just a little boy," Libby argued.

"When I was his age I was already better at doin' a whole lotta stuff than he is. Ain't nothin' but'cha tryin' ta baby him way too much. Boy's gotta grow up, an' he best be gettin' on it," Beau said. "Don't never know when somethin' might happen an' he might need ta use what he's got."

Beau expected Libby to keep arguing. That's how Libby was. Once she got started, she wasn't one to give up. For some people arguing was something they did at a sprint. They started, everything blew up, and then it was over. The whole thing was done and it was time to come down off their rampage. Libby, though, she saw arguing as a distance run. She could keep on going. Beau figured that she could probably argue most people into just giving in, no matter what they were arguing about.

Normally Beau avoided most arguments with Libby. The things that she got all fired up about weren't that important to him, so he just let her have her way. There wasn't any use in spending all your time bickering back and forth about something that wasn't going to make a difference.

This, though, on several levels did make a difference.

The practicality of having the door available to them to do what doors did was just obvious to Beau. He would have had no problem living in a cave somewhere or having some kind of hole to slip in and out of if that was the only available option, or even if it was the best available option, but given their current circumstances in the community it just didn't make sense to leave Libby's blockage intact any longer.

Walkers didn't get into the community…not often at least…and when they had gotten in, it wasn't on their own. There was no Walker that Beau had seen yet that was capable of breaking down a door on its own. They lacked the ability to reason ways to best go about it, so a Walker on its own was simply stopped by a barrier. A number of Walkers, perhaps, had the ability to break down a door, but that was more due to luck and sheer force of numbers than anything else, and any number of Walkers capable of busting down the door to the house could also bust through the wooden barrier. It might slow them down, maybe even considerably, but it wouldn't stop them.

Beau was also adamant in what he'd said about Emma and Jacob, and the same would eventually extend to Sam. Emma wasn't that much younger than Carl, but she'd been fairly sheltered by Libby…at least as far as anyone could be sheltered these days. She needed to know about Walkers and she needed practice killing them. If she ended up, through whatever turn of events, out there on her own just as Beau had been, or even if she ended up in Libby's shoes, she would be as good as dead.

Beau knew that you couldn't prevent death. He was level headed enough to know that death happened and it happened each and every day, but it seemed stupid to die for no reason at all simply because you weren't prepared to handle something that you could have easily taken care of given the correct resources. Teaching the kids, and teaching them young, how to handle weapons and how to kill Walkers was only reasonable.

Sadie was good at that kind of thing too. Beau's crush on the woman had begun to fade. He still considered her one of the most beautiful women that he'd ever seen in his life, but he respected the fact that she didn't want to have a relationship with him like so many of the people in the community had. She was interested, so it seemed, in Rick, and Beau respected her wishes. As a result, he'd lost to some degree his attraction to her. That didn't mean, though, that he'd lost his respect for her as a reliable comrade with admirable skills. One of those skills happened to be that the woman was in her element with Walkers…human attackers not so much…but Walkers didn't get the best of Sadie very easily. Beau thought, then, that it would be a good idea to get her working with the children and teaching them, under her protection, how to have the same level of confidence in their skills that she had.

Beau finished, finally, wrenching free the final board from the door. He turned around, realizing that Libby had been silent for far too long, and saw that she was gone. He was, as far as he could tell, alone in the lower level of the house.

Beau went about on his hands and knees for a moment and gathered up all the nails that he'd pulled loose from the boards. He got up and tossed them into the fireplace. He knew they wouldn't go anywhere, but it wasn't like it mattered and at least there no one was likely to step on them. They'd simply end up in the ash bucket for Carol to sort through later when she was making lye.

Beau wedged a few of the boards that he'd removed into the fireplace so that they would burn. The others he piled with the wood that they had stacked up on the floor for heating the house later. Satisfied that the area was as clean as it was going to be, and the door was now fully functional again, Beau laid Tyreese's hammer on the mantle to take with him the next time he passed back to the barn where Tyreese kept his tools.

He turned and mounted the steps of the house two at a time in search of Libby. He figured she might be sore that he tore the boards down and might need to do his best to try to soothe things over before she spent the rest of the day, or even a few days, not talking to him.

Emma was in the room that Jacob and Sam shared and she was entertaining them with some of the toys and books that Carol had brought over there for them. Beau nodded at her when he interrupted them by opening the door, but he quickly closed it and slipped into the other room, the small one, that Emma and Libby typically occupied.

Libby was sitting on her bed unravelling, one string at a time, a small section of her blanket.

"Ya shouldn't do that," Beau said. "Gonna get cold if ya keep unwindin' ya blanket like a ninny."

Libby looked at him. Anger and hurt were painted all over her face and her cheeks were bright red, almost matching the tangled mess of hair that was beginning to gain some length since Mark had hacked at it with scissors upon her arrival to the community.

"I can't believe ya'd throw 'em out there like that," Libby said. "I thought ya cared about 'em…I guess I was wrong."

Beau cocked his head to the side a little.

"What'cha talkin' 'bout?" Beau asked. Sometimes Libby didn't make all that much sense to him. He wasn't sure if it was because she was a girl and he didn't understand girls, or if he just wasn't always thinking about the same things that she was thinking about.

"Emma, Sam, Jacob…" Libby said. "They're all I got left, Beau. I thought'cha cared about 'em but now ya just want ta throw 'em out ta Walkers an' tell 'em ta fend for themselves when they ain't never done that shit before. They ain't even growed up yet."

Beau snickered a little.

"I reckon that when all of us started goin' after Walkers we ain't never done that shit before, Libby," Beau said. "Had ta be a first time for everyone, didn't they? Difference is that they got a chance ta learn how ta do it from people who know what they doin'. Beats the hell outta trial and error, don't it? That's what lost me my family an' it's what lost you yours. It cost a lotta people them that they cared about, but it don't gotta be that way."

"I don't want to lose them too, Beau," Libby said.

Beau shook his head.

"I don't want nothin' ta happen neither. That's why they gotta learn ta take care a' themselves. We ain't in no kinda world where ya can stand around an' hope that someone's gonna save ya. Ya gotta learn ta save yourself. Ain't no easy lesson, but it's one they gotta learn. For their own good," Beau said.

Libby sat silently for a minute and then she looked at Beau, nodding her head slightly.

"I guess you're right," she said. "I reckon they oughta learn before they gotta just do it."

"Especially if we gonna move on with the rest a' the group when they go," Beau said. "Much as ya might wanta look out for 'em, can't neither one a' us be in all places at the same time."

Libby nodded again.

"I'm gonna talk ta Sadie then," Libby said. "See if she can't work with Emma some…and maybe Jacob."

Beau nodded.

"That's a good idea," he said. "Reckon I'ma go now. My turn ta feed the animals in the barn an' we don't need nobody gettin' cranky in there an' tryin' ta tear the place down."

"I'll walk with ya," Libby said. "At least as far as headquarters."

Beau left the room and started down the stairs to wait for Libby at the bottom. He heard her tell Emma that she was leaving and they should head down to dinner before too long. Finally, Libby appeared, much calmer, at the top of the stairs and Beau watched her as she made her way to the bottom, joining him. Just as she reached him, she looped her arm through his.

"Reckon we can walk out the door this time," she said, giving him a slight smile.

"Almost like civilized folks," Beau teased, smiling at her and tugging her by the arm she had curled around his toward the door to get on with their chores.


End file.
